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POPULATION

AND THE

AMERICAN FUTURE

The most definitive investigation ever made

into the problems of population growth-and the consideration of the

legal and moral complexities they pose:

IMPLICATIONS OF GROWTH • ABORTION •

VOLUNTARY STERILIZATION • CONTRACEPTION

• RESOURCES AND THE ENVIRONMENT •

THE ECONOMY • RECOMMENDATIONS FOR CHANGE

ADVICE AND DISSENT

THE CONTROVERSY! ABORTION ON REQUEST

"The objective for American society should be to
make the child-bearing decision as free as possible
of unintended societal pressures"

The Majority Recommends —

ABORTION: Women should be free to control
their own fertility. State laws prohibiting abortion
should be liberalized; federal, state, and local
funds be made available to support abortion ser-
vices; and abortion costs be covered by health
insurance.

CONTRACEPTION: States should actively en-
courage teen-agers to receive contraceptive ser-
vices. Responsible sex education should be widely
available to all.

VOLUNTARY STERILIZATION: Hospitals
should relax their policies concerning voluntary
sterilization and make it easier to obtain.

The Minority Dissents—

ABORTION ON REQUEST will encourage ir-
responsible sexual activity. It does not account
for the legal or moral right of the unborn child
to live.

POPULATION AND THE AMERICAN FUTURE—
THE GREAT DEBATE CONTINUES

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POPULATION
AND THE

FUTURE

The Report of

The Commission on Population Growth
and the American Future

<Z>

A SIGNET SPECIAL from
NEW AMERICAN LIBRARY

TIMES MIRROR

This is an advance copy of the Commission's Report
and is subject to revisions and corrections in the official
version to be published by the Government Printing
Office.

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 72-77389

SIGNET TRADEMARK REG. U.S. PAT. OFF. AND FOREIGN COUNTRIES

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Signet, Signet Classics, Signette, Mentor and Plume Books

are published by The New American Library, Inc.,

1301 Avenue of the Americas, New York, New York 10019

First Printing, March, 1972

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

One of the most serious challenges to human
destiny in the last third of this century will be
the growth of the population. Whether man's
response to that challenge will be a cause for
pride or for despair in the year 2000 will depend
very much on what we do today. If we now
begin our work in an appropriate manner, and if
we continue to devote a considerable amount of
attention and energy to this problem, then man-
kind will be able to surmount this challenge as
it has surmounted so many during the long march
of civilization.

Richard Nixon
July 18, 1969

P^M

Commission on Population Growth
and the Ameriean Future

726 Jackson Place, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20506

March 27, 1972

To the President and Congress of the United States:

I have the honor to transmit for your consideration the
Final Report, containing the findings and recommendations,
of the Commission on Population Growth and the American
Future, pursuant to Sec 8, PL 91-213.

After two years of concentrated effort, we have concluded
that, in the long run, no substantial benefits will result from
further growth of the Nation's population, rather that the
gradual stabilization of our population would contribute
significantly to the Nation's ability to solve its problems.
We have looked for, and have not found, any convincing
economic argument for continued population growth. The
health of our country does not depend on it, nor does the
vitality of business nor the welfare of the average person.

The recommendations offered by this Commission are
directed towards increasing public knowledge of the causes
and consequences of population change, facilitating and
guiding the processes of population movement, maximizing
information about human reproduction and its consequences
for the family, and enabling individuals to avoid unwanted
fertility.

To these ends we offer this report in the hope that our
findings and recommendations will stimulate serious consid-
eration of an issue that is of great consequence to present
and future generations.

Respectfully submitted for the Commission

John D. Rockefeller 3rd
Chairman

The President

The President of the Senate

The Speaker of the House of Representatives

THE COMMISSION ON POPULATION GROWTH
AND THE AMERICAN FUTURE

CHAIRMAN

John D. Rockefeller 3rd

VICE CHAIRMAN
Grace Olivarez

Executive Director, Food for All, Inc.

VICE CHAIRMAN

Christian N. Ramsey, Jr., M.D.

President, The Institute for the Study of Health and Society

Joseph D. Beasley, M.D,

The Edward Wisner Professor of Public Health
Tulane University Medical Center

David E.Bell

Executive Vice President, The Ford Foundation

Bernard Berelson

President, The Population Council

Arnita Young Boswell

Associate Field Work Professor
School of Social Service Administration
University of Chicago

Margaret Bright

Professor, Dept. of Behavioral Sciences, and
Professor, Dept. of Epidemiology
School of Hygiene and Public Health
The Johns Hopkins University

Marilyn Brant Chandler

Housewife, Volunteer, Student

Paul B. Comely, M.D.

Professor, Dept. of Community Health Practice
College of Medicine Howard University, and
Assistant to the Executive Medical Officer
Welfare and Retirement Fund,
United Mine Workers of America

Alan Cranston

United States Senator
California

Lawrence A. Davis

President, Arkansas Agricultural, Mechanical & Normal
College

Otis Dudley Duncan

Professor of Sociology, University of Michigan

John N. Erlenborn

United States Representative
14th C. District of Illinois

Joan F.Flint

Housewife, Volunteer

R. V. Hansberger

Chairman and President, Boise Cascade Corporation

D. Gale Johnson

Chairman, Department of Economics, University of Chicago

John R. Meyer

President, National Bureau of Economic Research
Professor of Economics, Yale University

Bob Packwood

United States Senator
Oregon

James S. Rummonds

Student, Stanford School of Law

Stephen L. Salyer

Student, Davidson College

Howard D. Samuel

Vice President, Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America

James H. Scheuer

United States Representative
22nd C. District of New York

George D. Woods

Director and Consultant, The First Boston Corporation

This report represents the official views of the Commission, par-
ticularly as to the listed recommendations. Clearly, in the case
of a Commission with such diverse membership, not every Com-
missioner subscribes in detail to every suggestion or statement of
policy.

COMMISSION STAFF

Executive Director
Charles F. Westoff

Deputy Director
Robert Parke, Jr.

Directors of Research
Sara Mills Mazie
Elliott R. Morss
A. E. Keir Nash
Ritchie H. Reed*
Dianne Miller Wolman

Director of Policy

Coordination

Carol Tucker Foreman

Assistant to the Chairman
David K. Lelewer

Director of Public Information
Gerald Lipson

General Counsel
Ben C. Fisher

Administrative Officer
Lois A. Brooks

Editorial Coordinator
Carol F. Donnelly

Press Officer

Rochelle Kutcher Green

Professional Staff
Gail E. Auslander
Phyllis Coghlan
Florence F. Einhorn
Duane S. Elgin
Dorothy Mann
Susan Mcintosh
Steve W. Rawlings

Special Consultants
Daniel Callahan
Lenora T. Cartright
Robert F. Drury
Edgar M. Hoover
Frederick S. Jaffe
Peter A. Morrison
Ronald G. Ridker
Norman B. Ryder
Irene B. Taeuber

Support Staff
Mary Ann Ferguson
Mildred G. Herald
Kathryn E. Herron
Mac Arthur C. Jones
Kituria D. Littlejohn
Betty Marshall
Pearl R. Phillips
Diane O. Sergeant
Judith M. Stock
Mary C. Wilcher

Deceased

Because he deepened our conviction that each indi-
vidual has a unique contribution to make to the dig-
nity and worth of all mankind, the Commission and
staff dedicate this report to the memory of our col-
league, staff member, and friend,

Ritchie H. Reed
1941-1971

PREFACE

For the first time in the history of our country, the Presi-
dent and the Congress have established a Commission to
examine the growth of our population and the impact it will
have upon the American future. In proposing this Commission
in July 1969, President Nixon said: "One of the most serious
challenges to human destiny in the last third of this century
will be the growth of the population. Whether man's re-
sponse to that challenge will be a cause for pride or for
despair in the year 2000 will depend very much on what we
do today." The Commission was asked to examine the prob-
able extent of population growth and internal migration in
the United States between now and the end of this century,
to assess the impact that population change will have upon
government services, our economy, and our resources and
environment, and to make recommendations on how the
nation can best cope with that impact.

In our Interim Report a year ago, the Commission defined
the scope of our mandate: ". . . to formulate policy for the
future" — policy designed to deal with "the pervasive impact
of population growth on every facet of American life." We
said that population growth of the magnitude we have ex-
perienced since World War II has multiplied and intensified
many of our domestic problems and made their solution
more difficult. We called upon the American people to begin
considering the meaning and consequences of population
growth and internal migration and the desirability of formu-
lating a national policy on the question.

Since then, the Commission and staff have conducted an
extensive inquiry. We have enlisted many of the nation's
leading scientists in more than 100 research projects. We
have heard from more than 100 witnesses in public hearings
across the country and have met with experts in many days

of executive meetings. And we are aware that population has
become an active subject of consideration in a number of
states in our country concerned about their future. We have
come to recognize that the racial and ethnic diversity of this
Commission gives us confidence that our recommendations —
the consensus of our members — do indeed point the way in
which this nation should move in solving its problems. Because
of the importance of this matter, the Commission recom-
mends that future federal commissions include a substantial
representation of minorities, youth, poor citizens, and women
among their members, including congressional representatives,
and that commission staffs and consultants include significant
numbers of minorities, youth, and women.

We offer this report in the hope that our viewpoints and
recommendations will stimulate serious consideration and
response by the citizens of this nation and of nations through-
out the world to an issue of great consequence to present and
future generations.

CONTENTS

Letter of Transmittal vii
The Commission ix
Commission Staff xi
Preface xv

Chapter 1. Perspective on Population

A Diversity of Views 3
The Immediate Goal 6

Chapter 2. Population Growth 9

The United States 10
The "Birth Dearth" 14
The Boom Generation 17
Implications of Growth 19

Chapter 3. Population Distribution 23

Metropolitan Growth 25

Sources of Metropolitan Growth 27

Migration 28

Local Variations 29

Rural Areas and Small Towns 30

Metropolitan Dispersal 33
Public Attitudes 35
Where Do the Trends Lead Us? 37
Urban Regions 40
Population Stabilization, Migration, and
Distribution 43

Chapter 4. The Economy 45

Income 46

Economic Growth and the Quality of Life 47

Poverty 48

Labor Force Growth 49

Business 50

The Growth Mystique 51

Summary 53

Chapter 5. Resources and the
Environment 55

How Population Affects Resources and the

Environment 56
Minerals 57
Energy 59
Water 60

Outdoor Recreation 64
Agricultural Land and Food Prices 65
Pollution 66
Risks and Choices 70
The United States and the World 74
Long-Term Strategic Planning 76

Chapter 6. Government 77

Public Service Costs 78

State and Local Resources and Requirements 80

Democratic Representation and Participation 82

Administration of Justice 84

National Security 85

The Effects of Government Programs on

Population Distribution 86
Fragmentation of Metropolitan Government 87

Government Planning 88
Conclusion 89

Chapter 7. Social Aspects 93

Age Structure 94

The Aged 97

The Family 102

Population Density and Population Size 105

Racial and Ethnic Minorities 108

Chapter 8. Population and Public
Policy 115

A Legacy of Growth 7/5
The Choice About Future Growth 116
The Quality of American Life 118
Opportunity and Choice 119
Policy Goals 121

Chapter 9. Education 123

Population Education 123
Education for Parenthood 126

Costs of Children 127

Family Life Education 128

Nutrition 130

Environment and Heredity 131
Sex Education 133

Chapter 10. The Status of Children
and Women 139

The Children 139

Health and Development 139

Child Care 141

Adolescent Pregnancy and Children
Born out of Wedlock 144

Adoption 146
Institutional Pressures 148

Women: Alternatives to Childbearing 150

Tax Policy and Public Expenditures 156

Chapter 11. Human Reproduction 163

Contraception and the Law 767

Legal Impediments for Minors 168

Voluntary Sterilization 170

Abortion 172

The Law 172

The Moral Question 173

Public Health 174

Family Planning 1 75

The Demographic Context 176

Public Opinion 176

Recommendations 177

Methods of Fertility Control 775

Fertility-Related Services 755

Fertility-Related Health Services 754
Service Delivery and Personnel

Training 756
Family Planning Services 757
Services for Teenagers 755

Chapter 12. Population Stabilization 191

The Commission's Perspective 797

Criteria for Paths to Stabilization 792

An Illustration of an Optimal Path 794

The Likelihood of Population Stabilization 796

Chapter 13. Immigration 199

The Past 799

The Demographic Implications 200

Illegal Aliens 202

Competition for Work 203

Recommendations 204

Chapter 14. National Distribution and
Migration Policies 207

An Approach to Policy 208

The Meaning of a Metropolitan Future 209

A Dual Strategy 211

Guiding Urban Expansion 213

Racial Minorities and the Poor 217
Depressed Rural Areas 221
Institutional Responses 224

Federal 225

State 226

Local 227

Chapter 15. Population Statistics and
Research 231

Vital Statistics Data 233
Enumeration of Special Groups 234
International Migration 234
The Current Population Survey 235
Statistical Reporting of Family

Planning Services 236
National Survey of Family Growth 237
Distribution of Government Data 237
Mid-Decade Census 238
Statistical Use of Administrative Records 238
Intercensal Population Estimates 239
Social and Behavioral Research 239
Research Program In Population

Distribution 243
Federal Government Population Research 244
Support for Professional Training 244

Chapter 16. Organizational Changes 247

Office of Population Affairs, Department
of Health, Education and Welfare 248

National Institute of Population Sciences 249

Department of Community Development 250

Office of Population Growth and
Distribution 252

Council of Social Advisors 254

Joint Committee on Population 254

State Population Agencies and
Commissions 255

Private Efforts and Population Policy 256

Separate Statements 259

Marilyn Brant Chandler 261
Paul B. Comely, M.D. 263
Alan Cranston 267
Otis Dudley Duncan 274
John N. Erlenborn 276
D. Gale Johnson 286
John R. Meyer 288
Grace Olivarez 291
James S. Rummonds 299
Howard D. Samuel 311
George D. Woods 312

References 313

Appendix 333

Research Papers 335
Consultants 345
Consulting Organizations 350
Participants in Public Hearings 351
Mandates 358

CHAPTER 1. PERSPECTIVE ON
POPULATION

In the brief history of this nation, we have always assumed
that progress and "the good life" are connected with popula-
tion growth. In fact, population growth has frequently been
regarded as a measure of our progress. If that were ever the
case, it is not now. There is hardly any social problem con-
fronting this nation whose solution would be easier if our
population were larger. Even now, the dreams of too many
Americans are not being realized; others are being fulfilled at
too high a cost. Accordingly, this Commission has concluded
that our country can no longer afford the uncritical accept-
ance of the population growth ethic that "more is better."
And beyond that, after two years of concentrated effort, we
have concluded that no substantial benefits would result from
continued growth of the nation's population.

The "population problem" is long run and requires long-
run responses. It is not a simple problem. It cannot be en-
compassed by the slogans of either of the prevalent extremes:
the "more" or the "bigger the better" attitude on the one
hand, or the emergency-crisis response on the other. Neither
extreme is accurate nor even helpful.

It is a problem which can be interpreted in many ways. It
is the pressure of population reaching out to occupy open
spaces and bringing with it a deterioration of the environment.
It can be viewed as the effect on natural resources of increased
numbers of people in search of a higher standard of living. It
is the impact of population fluctuations in both growth and

distribution upon the orderly provision of public services. It
can be seen as the concentration of people in metropolitan
areas and depopulation elsewhere, with all that implies for
the quality of life in both places. It is the instability over
time of proportions of the young, the elderly, and the pro-
ductive. For the family and the individual, it is the control
over one's life with respect to the reproduction of new life —
the formal and informal pronatalist pressures of an outmoded
tradition, and the disadvantages of and to the children in-
volved.

Unlike other great public issues in the United States, popu-
lation lacks the dramatic event — the war, the riot, the calamity
— that galvanizes attention and action. It is easily overlooked
and neglected. Yet the number of children born now will
seriously affect our lives in future decades. This produces a
powerful effect in a double sense: Its fluctuations can be
strong and not easily changed; and its consequences are im-
portant for the welfare of future generations.

There is scarcely a facet of American life that is not in-
volved with the rise and fall of our birth and death rates:
the economy, environment, education, health, family life and
sexual practices, urban and rural life, governmental effective-
ness and political freedoms, religious norms, and secular life
styles. If this country is in a crisis of spirit — environmental
deterioration, racial antagonisms, the plight of the cities, the
international situation — then population is part of that crisis.

Although population change touches all of these areas of
our national life and intensifies our problems, such problems
will not be solved by demographic means alone. Population
policy is no substitute for social, economic, and environmental
policy. Successfully addressing population requires that we also
address our problems of poverty, of minority and sex dis-
crimination, of careless exploitation of resources, of environ-
mental deterioration, and of spreading suburbs, decaying
cities, and wasted countrysides. By the same token, because
population is so tightly interwoven with all of these concerns,
whatever success we have in resolving these problems will
contribute to easing the complex system of pressures that
impel population growth.

Consideration of the population issue raises profound ques-
tions of what people want, what they need — indeed, what they
are for. What does this nation stand for and where is it going?
At some point in the future, the finite earth will not satis-
factorily accommodate more human beings — nor will the
United States. How is a judgment to be made about when that
point will be reached? Our answer is that now is the time to

confront the question: "Why more people?" The answer must
be given, we believe, in qualitative not quantitative terms.

The United States today is characterized by low population
density, considerable open space, a declining birthrate, move-
ment out of the central cities — but that does not eliminate the
concern about population. This country, or any country,
always has a "population problem," in the sense of achieving
a proper balance between size, growth, and distribution on
the one hand, and, on the other, the quality of life to which
every person in this country aspires.

Nor is this country alone in the world, demographically or
in any other way. Many other nations are beginning to recog-
nize the importance of population questions. We need to act
prudently, understanding that today's decisions on population
have effects for generations ahead. Similarly, we need to act
responsibly toward other people in the world: This country's
needs and wants, given its wealth, may impinge upon the
patrimony of other, less fortunate peoples in the decades
ahead. The "population problem" of the developing countries
may be more pressing at this time, but in the longer perspec-
tive, it is both proper and in our best interest to participate
fully in the worldwide search for the good life, which must in-
clude the eventual stabilization of our numbers.

A DIVERSITY OF VIEWS

Ultimately, then, we are concerned not with demographic
trends alone, but with the effect of these trends on the realiza-
tion of the values and goals cherished as part of the American
tradition and sought after by minorities who also "want in."

One of the basic themes underlying our analysis and policy
recommendations is the substitution of quality for quantity;
that is, we should concern ourselves with improving the qual-
ity of life for all Americans rather than merely adding more
Americans. And unfortunately, for many of our citizens that
quality of life is still defined only as enough food, clothing,
and shelter. All human beings need a sense of their own dig-
nity and worth, a sense of belonging and sharing, and the
opportunity to develop their individual potentialities.

But it is far easier to achieve agreement on abstract values
than on their meaning or on the strategy to achieve them.
Like the American people generally, this Commission has not
been able to reach full agreement on the relative importance

of different values or on the analysis of how the "population
problem" reflects other conditions and directions of American
society.

Three distinct though overlapping approaches have been
distinguished. These views differ in their analysis of the nature
of the problem and the general priorities of tasks to be ac-
complished. But, despite the different perspectives from which
population is viewed, all of the population policies we shall
recommend are consistent with all three positions.

The first perspective acknowledges the benefits to be gained
by slowing growth, but regards our population problem today
primarily as a result of large numbers of people being unable
to control an important part of their lives — the number of
children they have. The persistence of this problem reflects an
effective denial of freedom of choice and equality of access
to the means of fertility control. In this view, the population
problem is regarded more as the sum of such individual prob-
lems than as a societal problem transcending the interests of
individuals; the welfare of individuals and that of the general
society are seen as congruent, at least at this point in history.
The potential conflict between these two levels is mitigated by
the knowledge that freedom from unwanted childbearing
would contribute significantly to the stabilization of popula-
tion.

Reproductive decisions should be freely made in a social
context without pronatalist pressures — the heritage of a past
when the survival of societies with high mortality required
high fertility. The proper mission for government in this mat-
ter is to ensure the fullest opportunity for people to decide
their own future in this regard, based on the best available
knowledge; then the demographic outcome becomes the
democratic solution.

Beyond these goals, this approach depends on the processes
of education, research, and national debate to illuminate the
existence of any serious population "problem" that transcends
individual welfare. The aim would be to achieve the best col-
lective decision about population issues based on knowledge
of the tradeoffs between demographic choices and the "quality
of life," however defined. This position ultimately seeks to
optimize the individual and the collective decisions and then
accepts the aggregate outcome — with the understanding that
the situation will be reconsidered from time to time.

The second view does not deny the need for education and
knowledge, but stresses the crucial gaps between what we
claim as national values and the reality experienced by certain

groups in our society. Many of the traditional American
values, such as freedom and justice, are not yet experienced
by some minorities. Racial discrimination continues to mean
that equal access to opportunities afforded those in the main-
stream of American society is denied to millions of people.
Overt and subtle discrimination against women has meant
undue pressure toward childbearing and child-rearing. Equal-
ity is denied when inadequate income, education, or racial
and sexual stereotypes persist, and shape available options.
Freedom is denied when governmental steps are not taken to
assure the fullest possible access to methods of controlling
reproduction or to educational, job, and residential oppor-
tunities. In addition, the freedom of future generations may
be compromised by a denial of freedom to the present genera-
tion. Finally, extending freedom and equality — which is noth-
ing more than making the American system live up to its
stated values — would go far beyond affecting the growth rate.
Full equality both for women and for racial minorities is a
value in its own right. In this view, the "population problem"
is seen as only one facet, and not even a major one, of the
restriction of full opportunity in American life.

The third position deals with the population problem in
an ecological framework, one whose primary axiom asserts
the functional interdependence of man and his environment.
It calls for a far more fundamental shift in the operative
values of modern society. The need for more education and
knowledge and the need to eliminate poverty and racism are
important, but not enough. For the population problem, and
the growth ethic with which it is intimately connected, reflect
deeper external conditions and more fundamental political,
economic, and philosophical values. Consequently, to improve
the quality of our existence while slowing growth, will require
nothing less than a basic recasting of American values.

The numbers of people and the material conditions of
human existence are limited by the external environment.
Human life, like all forms of life on earth, is supported by
intricate ecological systems that are limited in their ability
to adapt to and tolerate changing conditions. Human culture,
particularly science and technology, has given man an ex-
traordinary power to alter and manipulate his environment.
At the same time, he has also achieved the capacity virtually
to destroy life on earth. Sadly, in the rush to produce, con-
sume, and discard, he has too often chosen to plunder and
destroy rather than to conserve and create. Not only have the

land, air, and water, the flora and fauna suffered, but also
the individual, the family, and the human community.

This position holds that the present pattern of urban in-
dustrial organization, far from promoting the realization of
the individual as a uniquely valuable experience, serves pri-
marily to perpetuate its own values. Mass urban industrialism
is based on science and technology, efficiency, acquisition, and
domination through rationality. The exercise of these same
values now contain the potential for the destruction of our
humanity. Man is losing that balance with nature which is an
essential condition of human existence. With that loss has
come a loss of harmony with other human beings. The popu-
lation problem is a concrete symptom of this change, and a
fundamental cause of present human conditions.

It is comfortable to believe that changes in values or in
the political system are unnecessary, and that measures such
as population education and better fertility control information
and services will solve our population problem. They will not,
however, for such solutions do not go to the heart of man's
relationship with nature, himself, and society. According to
this view, nothing less than a different set of values toward
nature, the transcendence of a laissez-faire market system, a
redefinition of human identity in terms other than consumer-
ism, and a radical change if not abandonment of the growth
ethic, will suffice. A new vision is needed — a vision that
recognizes man's unity with nature, that transcends a simple
economic definition of man's identity, and that seeks to pro-
mote the realization of the highest potential of our individual
humanity.

THE IMMEDIATE GOAL

These three views reflect different evaluations of the nature
of the population problem, different assessments of the via-
bility of the American political process, and different percep-
tions of the critical values at stake.

Given the diversity of goals to be addressed and the mani-
fold ramifications of population change throughout society,
how are specific population policies to be selected?

As a Commission and as a people, we need not agree on all
the priorities if we can identify acceptable policies that speak
in greater or lesser degree to all of them. By and large, in our
judgment, the policy findings and recommendations of this

Report meet that requirement. Whatever the primary needs
of our society, the policies recommended here all lead in right
directions for this nation, and generally at low costs.*

Our immediate goal is to modernize demographic behavior
in this country: to encourage the American people to make
population choices, both in the individual family and society
at large, on the basis of greater rationality rather than tradition
or custom, ignorance or chance. This country has already
moved some distance down this road; it should now complete
the journey. The time has come to challenge the tradition that
population growth is desirable: What was unintended may
turn out to be unwanted, in the society as in the family.

In any case, more rational attitudes are now forced upon
us by the revolutionary increase in average length of life within
the past century, which has placed modern man in a completely
different, historically unique, demographic situation. The social
institutions and customs that have shaped reproductive be-
havior in the past are no longer appropriate in the modern
world, and need reshaping to suit the new situation. Moreover,
the instruments of population policy are now more readily
available — fuller knowledge of demographic impacts, better
information on demographic trends, improved means by which
individuals may control their own fertility.

As a Commission, we have come to appreciate the delicate
complexities of the subject and the difficulty, even the impos-
sibility, of solving the problem, however defined, in its entirety
and all at once. But this is certainly the time to begin: The
1970's may not be simply another decade in the demographic
transition but a critical one, involving changes in family life
and the role of women, dynamics of the metropolitan process,
the depopulation of rural areas, the movement and the needs
of disadvantaged minorities, the era of the young adults pro-
duced by the baby boom, and the attendant question of what
their own fertility will be — baby boom or baby bust.

Finally, we agree that population policy goals must be
sought in full consonance with the fundamental values of
American life: respect for human freedom, human dignity,
and individual fulfillment; and concern for social justice and
social welfare. To "solve" population problems at the cost
of such values would be a Pyrrhic victory indeed. The issues
are ethical in character, and their proper solution requires a
deep sense of moral responsibility on the part of both the in-
dividual family and the national community: the former in

*A separate statement by Commissioner James S. Rummonds appears
on pages 299-305.

considering another birth, the latter in considering appropri-
ate policies to guide population growth into the American
future.

For our part, it is enough to make population, and all that
it means, explicit on the national agenda, to signal its impact
on our national life, to sort out the issues, and to propose how
to start toward a better state of affairs. By its very nature,
population is a continuing concern and should receive con-
tinuing attention. Later generations, and later commissions,
will be able to see the right path further into the future. In
any case, no generation needs to know the ultimate goal or the
final means, only the direction in which they will be found.

CHAPTER 2. POPULATION GROWTH

The tremendous growth in the world's population is a recent
development in the history of mankind. In pre-industrial times,
birthrates were high; but hunger, ignorance, and disease com-
bined to stack the odds against an infant surviving to the age
of parenthood. Societies required high birthrates simply to keep
themselves going.

In modern times, the reductions in mortality have given the
average person a longer, healthier life and have inaugurated
a phase of rapid population growth. The world's population
grew from one-half billion around 1650, to about 1*4 billion
by 1900, to 2x/i billion in 1950, and had already surpassed 3V£
billion by 1970. The world's total has doubled during the last
50 years.

From the beginning of the Christian era to 1650, mankind
increased by an average of 150,000 persons a year. Today, the
world total is increasing by about 78 million persons annually.
If current rates of growth continue for another 50 years, the
world's population will number some 10 billion.

The same civilization that achieved a lengthening of life
in Europe and America also evolved an urban way of life in
which the institutional supports to high fertility were gradually
eroded, and developed a technology that reduced the role of
ignorance and error in reproduction. The technology of mor-
tality control was exported to the rest of the world. There
was far less exporting of the underlying social and economic
changes which gave rise to this technology, and only recently
have efforts been made to export reproduction control.

Because of declining birthrates, the advanced nations have
been narrowing the gap between birthrates and death rates in

the 20th century. These nations have been approaching a
stabilized population — one in which births and deaths have
come into balance. The historical transition has been from a
stabilized population maintained by high birthrates, high and
erratic death rates, and short lifetimes, toward a stabilized
population characterized by low birthrates, low death rates,
and long lifetimes. When birthrates once again equal death
rates, these nations will have completed the demographic
transition.

Ultimately, this transition must be completed. Population
growth at our current rate of about one percent per year would
double the population every 70 years. Such growth leads to
"standing room only" if continued indefinitely. By one means
or another, such an impossible result will be avoided. An aver-
age of zero growth over the long term — a stabilized population
— must and inevitably will be reestablished.1 The question is
when it will happen, and how. In this, we in the United States
may exercise choice.

THE UNITED STATES

No country has completed the demographic transition, and
the United States will probably not be the first to do so. A dis-
cussion of our prospects for completing it requires some ap-
preciation of the dynamics of our population during the first
70 years of the 20th century.

Even a cursory examination of the data reveals that, since
1900, the United States has undergone something of a demo-
graphic revolution. (See table on page 11.) In terms of total
numbers, our population has increased from about 76 million
in 1900 to almost 205 million in 1970. This represents an addi-
tional 129 million people that our society has been called upon
to accommodate over the past 70 years. By mid-1972, our
country will have about 209 million people.

The growth of population is sustained only as long as the
yearly number of new entrants (births and immigrants) exceeds
the number required to replace those who die or emigrate.
Although the United States has always been a growing popula-
tion, the rapid growth rates characterizing our early years
began to taper off in the 19th century.

In the 20th century, we have seen substantial changes in all
three components of population growth — fertility, mortality,

Demographic Perspective of 20th Century United States

Around 1900

Around 1970

Population

76 million

205 million

Life expectancy

47 years

70 years

Median age

23 years

28 years

Births per 1000
population

Deaths per 1000
population

Immigrants per 1000
population

Annual growth

13A million

2V4 million

Growth rate

2.3 percent

1.1 percent

sources: U. S. Bureau of the Census, Historical Statistics of the United States,
Colonial Times to 1957, 1961. U. S. National Center for Health Statistics,
Vital Statistics of the United States, Volume II Section 5, Life Tables, 1968.
Irene B. Taeuber, "Growth of the Population of the United States in the
Twentieth Century" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

and migration. First, consider the birthrate. It is important to
understand that this measure simply indicates the average level
of yearly births in the population. Although it obscures a con-
siderable amount of variation associated with such factors as
age and socioeconomic status, it is nevertheless a useful mea-
sure of the contribution of births to population growth. The
birthrate was about 32 births per 1,000 population in 1900,
and declined fairly steadily to about 18 per 1,000 in the depths
of the Depression. Just when the experts had become con-
vinced— some even concerned — that our level of fertility would
soon dip below the level required for replacement of the
population, couples began increasing their rates of childbear-
ing. This aberration in the history of American fertility, of
which we will have more to say shortly, came to be called the
"baby boom." By 1947, the birthrate stood at 27 per 1,000,
and it remained at around 25 per 1,000 for a decade before
resuming its long-term decline. By the early 1960's, the boom

had run its course, and our birthrate today is below pre-World
War II levels.2 (See chart on page 13.)

A second basic determinant of how fast a nation grows is
the degree to which it succeeds in preserving and extending
the lives of its people. We have seen dramatic progress toward
reducing the threat of early death. The death rate has fallen
from about 17 per 1,000 population at the turn of the century,
to its present level of about nine per 1,000. The average life
expectancy today is about 70 years,3 or 23 years longer than
in 1900. Most of these declines in mortality were achieved
prior to 1960, and all segments of our population have gained
some, though not equal, benefits in terms of increased longev-
ity.

In the United States, mortality during the early years of life
is already so low that any substantial further improvements in
life expectancy will have to come primarily among persons
over the age of 50. Since this segment of the population is
generally beyond childbearing, the extension of their life span
would not result in any significant increase in births. Conse-
quently, further additions to the duration of life in this country
would simply result in somewhat larger numbers of people at
the older ages, where they still can be quite productive mem-
bers of society.

The third factor associated with growth is, of course, immi-
gration. Only the Indians, who numbered less than one mil-
lion4 when the first English colonists settled in Massachusetts
and Virginia, can rightfully claim original status. Our popula-
tion is comprised primarily of immigrants and their descen-
dants. Since 1900 alone, 20 million more people have moved
into this country than out of it. Approximately 40 percent of
the population growth in the first decade of this century was
attributable to immigration. During the 1930's, the number of
immigrants was slightly lower than the number of people leav-
ing the country. Immigration once again increased following
World War II, and during the 1960's, it accounted for about
16 percent of our national growth.6

When all of these demographic credits and debits are tallied,
we are left with either net population growth or net decline.
The United States has had a long history of diminishing
growth rates. Our annual rate of growth dropped from about
3.3 percent in the second decade of the 19th century to 2.1
percent by the first decade of this century, to an average of
around 0.7 percent during the 1930's. It then rose to about
1.9 percent during the fifties, before falling to its present level

TOTAL FERTILITY RATE

CHILDREN PER WOMAN

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1800 '10 '20 '30 '40 '50 '60 70 '80 '90 19Q0 '10 '20 '30 '40 '50 '60 197Q

♦Prior to 1917 data available only for white population; after 1917,
for total population.

Annual births expressed in terms of implied completed family size,
declined until the 1930's, rose, and fell again.

sources: Prior to 1917 — Ansley J. Coale and Melvin Zelnik, New Estimates of
Fertility and Population in the United States, (Princeton: Princeton University
Press) 1963. 1917 to 1968— U. S. National Center for Health Statistics, Natality
Statistics Analysis, Series 21, Number 19, 1970. 1969 to 1971— U. S. Bureau
of the Census, Current Population Reports, Series P-23, No. 36, "Fertility
Indicators: 1970," 1971. The figure for 1971 is based on an unpublished
Census staff estimate.

of 1.1 percent. However, the size of our population is now so
large that even our low current rate of growth translates into
about 2Va million people added to our society each year —
more than enough to fill a city the size of Philadelphia.

We cannot predict how fast our population will grow in
the years ahead, but we can be sure that, barring some unfore-
seen catastrophe, substantial additions to our numbers lie
ahead. Our population has a potential for further growth
greater than that of almost any other advanced country. The
reasons for this are a pattern of early and nearly universal
marriage and childbearing, fertility levels above those required
to replace the parental generation, and a preponderance of
youth in the population. The youngsters born during the baby
boom are reaching adulthood today and beginning to do many
of the things their parents and grandparents did before them

— finishing school, seeking jobs, developing careers, getting
married, and having children of their own.

THE "BIRTH DEARTH"

In the summer of 1971, the news media spread a report
that, because women were having fewer babies than had been
expected, we were in the midst of a "baby bust." That story
was based on data for the first six months of 1971, which
showed a drop in birthrates at a time when most of the experts
had expected them to rise again as the baby-boom generation
reached adulthood. These expectations seemed to be realized
when the birthrate, after reaching a new low of 17.5 in 1968,
moved up to about 18.2 in 1970.6 But, instead of continuing
upward in 1971, the rate dropped back to about 17.3, and so
was born the idea of the "birth dearth."

This phenomenon is notable because birthrates are showing
declines at a time when everyone was expecting them to in-
crease. It had long been assumed that birthrates would rise
during the 1970's as potential parents who were born during
the baby-boom years came of age. If general fertility (the rate
of childbearing among women aged 15 to 44) remained con-
stant, there would be an unavoidable "echo boom" in the
birthrate of the total population, as larger and larger numbers
of potential parents reached childbearing age. The increase in
the number of people entering the childbearing ages is, how-
ever, presently being offset by a decline in the level of general
fertility.

Two factors seem to account for this recent decline. One is
temporary; the other may or may not be permanent. The first
element arises from the fact that we are now in a period of
gradually rising age at childbearing. This means that, in any
given year, some fraction of the births is, in effect, postponed
to a later year. The effect is temporary because the age at
childbearing will not rise indefinitely; when it stabilizes, the
postponement will stop and the birthrate will rise again.

The other and more important element is that today*s young
people expect to have far fewer children than people a few
years their senior. On the average, women now in their late
thirties already have more than three children. According to a
1971 Census Bureau survey, married women 18 to 24 say
that they expect to have an average of 2.4 children before
they complete their families.7 Not everyone will marry, so the
total for this generation could ultimately be lower. On the

other hand, experience with similar surveys in the past indi-
cates that women usually end up having more children than
they estimated when they were young. The baby-bust phenom-
enon is significant and somewhat surprising, but it would be
premature to say that we are on the verge of a fertility level
that would ultimately stabilize the population.

The baby-bust psychology may give rise to unwarranted
complacency born of the notion that all of the problems asso-
ciated with population growth are somehow behind us. Our
population growth has developed its own momentum which
makes it very difficult to stop, no matter how hard the brakes
are applied. Even if immigration from abroad ceased and
couples had only two children on the average — just enough
to replace themselves — our population would continue to
grow for about 70 years. (See charts on pages 15-16.) Our
past rapid growth has given us so many young couples that,
to bring population growth to an immediate halt, the birthrate
would have to drop by almost 50 percent, and today's young
generation of parents would have to limit themselves to an
average of about one child.8 That is just not going to happen.

PERSONS 20 TO 29 YEARS OLD

MILLIONS
60 —

S" --• •-"'

80 —

20 —

10 —

1950 '60 70 '80 '90 2000

AN AVERAGE OF 2 CHILDREN PER FAMILY WOULD SLOW POPU-
LATION GROWTH, BUT WOULD NOT STOP IT SOON BECAUSE THE
NUMBER OF PEOPLE OF CHILDBEARING AGE IS INCREASING.

source: U. S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports, Series P-25.

SO, EVEN IF FAMILY SIZE DROPS TO A 2-CHILD AVERAGE, THE RESULTING BIRTHS
WILL CONTINUE TO EXCEED DEATHS FOR THE REST OF THIS CENTURY

MILLIONS

5 —

1 —

1950

1960

1970

1980

1990

2000

source: U. S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports, Series P-25.

SO THE POPULATION WILL STILL BE GROWING IN THE YEAR 2000,
BUT AT A DECREASING RATE.

MILLIONS
300 —

200 —

100 —

ANNUAL GROWTH RATE

1.0%

0.7%

1.0%

1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000

source: U. S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports, Series P-25.

THE BOOM GENERATION

The postwar baby boom is over, but those born during the
boom period are still very much with us. Our society has not
had an easy time thus far in its attempts to accommodate the
baby-boom generation, and their impact is not likely to di-
minish in the near future. Over the past couple of decades,
most of the problems have been associated with providing for
their schooling. Shortages of classrooms and teachers began to
plague our elementary schools in the mid-1950's.

Similar difficulties have become commonplace in our sec-
ondary schools and colleges as the bulk of the boom generation
advances to higher levels of education. At the same time,
primary schools are now having to cope with smaller enroll-
ments. The number of children entering first grade has stopped
escalating, and is now declining. Furthermore, in contrast to
the serious teacher shortage of the 1950's, we are now faced
with more teachers than the system can readily absorb. The
National Education Association recently observed that, during
the remainder of this decade, there will be at least two quali-
fied graduates seeking a teaching position for every available
job.9 Thus, the baby boom has left us with a legacy of problems
attendant on both rapid increases and decreases in the flow
of people passing through our educational system.

This new wave of humanity has made itself felt in areas
outside the educational arena as well. Many current problems
that we do not normally associate with population growth can
be understood, in part, as an effect of the growing-up of the
baby-boom generation. For instance, it is generally recognized
that young drivers have higher accident rates than the rest of
the population. Hence, recent increases in traffic accidents are
partially attributable to the fact that many of those born in
the baby boom became drivers during the 1960's.

An awareness of the same sort of population dynamics can
also help us to understand the increasing volume of crime
during the past decade. Since the crime rate is higher among
persons under 25 than among older people, much of the in-
crease in crime during recent years is traceable to an expan-
sion in the relative number of persons in the youthful age
groups. About 28 percent of the reported increase between
1960 and 1970 in the number of arrests for serious crimes can
be attributed to an increase in the percentage of the popu-
lation under 25. Another 22 percent of the increase can be

explained by the growing size of the population and other
demographic factors. Thus, population change alone accounted
for about half of the reported increase in the number of arrests
for serious crimes over the past decade.10

Now, as the youth culture of the sixties evolves into the
young adult society of the seventies, the impact is being felt
in the housing and job markets. In the two decades before
1965, about 48 million Americans reached the age of 20. Be-
tween 1965 and 1985, over 78 million will cross this impor-
tant threshold.

As those born during the baby boom move off the campus
or leave their parents' homes, we can expect a 33-percent jump
in annual household formation by the end of this decade. Be-
tween 1950 and 1966, the number of households grew at a
relatively steady rate of around 900,000 per year. After that,
the rate began to climb, and last year we added well over the
million households. Our research shows that the rate will in-
crease to almost 1.5 million households added each year by
the end of the seventies, and will remain at that level until
about 1985. These figures understate future demand for the
construction of new housing, since additional new housing
units will be required to replace part of the older housing
stock.

Along with increased housing demands will come greater
demand for employment opportunities. The highest rates of
joblessness are found among the young. Consequently, one
factor to be considered, irrespective of the state of the economy
itself, is the sheer increase in the numbers of young people
seeking work. The Bureau of Labor Statistics tells us that we
can expect about 3Vi million persons to make their initial entry
into the labor force each year during the 1970's. This level of
prospective job seekers exceeds the annual average for the
1960's by about 700,000 persons a year. Here again, we can
attribute the large numbers to a heavy influx of new job-
seekers who were born during the baby boom.11

The boom generation will continue to exert a heavy impact
on our society as they move up the age ladder. Eventually,
they will reach retirement age; at that point, we can expect
added pressure on retirement systems as the proportion of
beneficiaries in the population increases. Today, we have an
estimated 20 million senior citizens. About 50 years from now
we will have an estimated 40 million, twice the present number.

In sum, it should be evident that, even if the recent unex-
pected drop in the birthrate should develop into a sustained
trend, there is little cause for complacency. Whether we see

U.S. POPULATION: 2 v$ 3 CHILD FAMILY

MILLIONS

1000 —

$00 — /

700 —

500 —

400 MILLION

-**

300 MILLION^ 1M5

300— ^*«# „i..^??n?n

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1870 '80 '90 1900 '10 '20 '30 '40 '50 '60 1970 '80 '90 2000 '10 '20 '30 '40 '50 '60 '70

The population of the United States passed the 100-million mark in 1915 and
reached 200 million in 1968. If families average two children in the future,
growth rates will slow, and the population will reach 300 million in the year
2015. At the 3-child rate, the population would reach 300 million in this cen-
tury and 400 million in the year 2013. (Projections assume small future reduc-
tions in mortality, and assume future immigration at present levels.)

sources: Prior to 1900 — U. S. Bureau of the Census, Historical Statistics of
the United States, Colonial Times to 1957, 1961. 1900 to 2020 — U. S. Bureau
of the Census, Current Population Reports, Series P-25. 2021 to 2050 — unpub-
lished Census Bureau projections. Beyond 2050 — extrapolation.

it or not — whether we like it or not — we are in for a long
period of growth, and we had best prepare for it.

IMPLICATIONS OF GROWTH

It is clear that we are confronted with a continuing legacy
of population growth in this country. Much of it is unavoid-
able, but its full extent will depend upon choices made by
American couples in the years immediately ahead.

If families in the United States have only two children on
the average and immigration continues at current levels, our
population would grow to 271 million by the end of the cen-
tury. If, however, families should have an average of three
children, the population would reach 322 million by the year

UNITED STATES POPULATION, 1970 AND 2000

(Numbers in Millions)

1970

20
2-child average

3-child average

All Ages

205

271

322

Under 5

6 to 17
18 to 21

53
15

55
17

80
24

under 18
18 to 64

65 and over

70
115

75
29

114
179

Dependency
Ratioa

aNumber of persons 65 and over plus persons under 18 per 100
persons aged 18 to 64.

These data are based on the Census Bureau's Current Population Reports,
Series P-25, No. 470, "Projections of the Population of the United States
by Age and Sex: 1970 to 2000." These projections served as the basis for
much of the research reported in this volume. We examined how the popu-
lation would grow between now and the year 2000 under the 2-child family
projection (Census Series E) and under the 3-child projection (Census
Series B).

Series B assumes that in the future, women will be giving birth at an
"ultimate" rate averaging out to 3.1 children per woman over her lifetime.
The transition from the 1969 rate of 2.4 to the "ultimate" future rate is not
instantaneous in the projections, but most of the change is assumed to
occur by 1980. The 3.1 figure is an average for all women, regardless of
marital status. In the United States today, almost all women (95 percent)
marry at some time in their lives, so the Series B rate of childbearing repre-
sents a reasonable approximation to an average family of 3 children.

Series E assumes an ultimate rate of childbearing that works out to an
average of 2.1 children per woman over a lifetime. This is the rate at which
the parental generation would exactly replace itself. The extra 0.1 allows for
mortality between birth and the average age of mothers at childbearing, and
for the fact that boy babies slightly outnumber girl babies.

Different generations bora in the 20th century have reproduced at widely
varying average levels, some exceeding three children (as did the women
bora from 1930 to 1935) and some approaching two (as did women
who were born from 1905 to 1910). The fact that major groups in our
modern history have reproduced at each of these levels lends credibility to
projections based on either of these averages.

It is assumed in both projections that future reductions in mortality will
be slight. The net flow of immigrants into the United States is assumed, in
the projections, to continue at the present level of about 400,000 persons
annually.

2000. One hundred years from now, the 2-child family would
result in a population of about 350 million persons, whereas,
the 3 -child family would produce a total of nearly a billion.
(See chart on page 19.) Thus, a difference of only one extra
child per family would result in an additional 51 million peo-
ple over the next three decades, and if extended over a cen-
tury, an additional two-thirds of a billion people.

When we speak of 2- or 3 -child families, we are talking
about averages which can be made up by many possible com-
binations of family sizes, ranging from childless couples to
those with many children.

The total size of our future population is not our sole con-
cern. Perhaps just as important are the changes which lie
ahead in the size of various age categories that play an im-
portant role in the demands placed on our society.

If families average three children, we can expect to find
about 46 percent more young people of elementary and sec-
ondary school age (5 to 17 years), and 36 percent more per-
sons of college age (18 to 21 years) in the year 2000, than
would be the case if families average only two children. (See
table on page 20.) Thus, a difference of only one child per
family will have important consequences for the magnitude of
the load on our educational system.

The burden placed on those in the economically active seg-
ment of the population, traditionally considered to be those
aged 18 to 64, will also be influenced by future family size.
The dependency burden is determined chiefly by the propor-
tion of the population in the childhood and adolescent years.
Projections indicate that the number of persons in the depen-
dent ages under 18 in the year 2000 would be 52 percent
greater if families average three children than if the 2-child
average prevails. The size of the population 65 and over in the
year 2000 would be unaffected by changes in the average
number of children, since everyone who will be over the age
of 30 at the end of this century is already born. Consequently,
the numbers in the dependent ages, relative to persons of
working age, would be about one-third larger under the 3-
child than under the 2-child projection.

To understand the importance of these prospects, we need
first to see how the social and economic transformation of the
United States has altered the geographic distribution of popu-
lation and to assess the likely effect of alternative population
futures on our economy, resources, environment, government,
and social conditions. We turn to these in the following
chapters.

CHAPTER 3. POPULATION DISTRIBUTOR

Americans are a metropolitan people. Most families live in
metropolitan areas; most births, deaths, and migration take
place in them. But the traditions and nostalgia are farm and
small town.

Our transition from rural to metropolitan has been rapid.
At the beginning of this century, 60 percent of the people lived
on farms or in villages. When people now 50 years old were
born, half the population was rural. In fact, it is only those be-
low age 25 whose life experience is more attuned to a society
that is two-thirds metropolitan and becoming more so. Perhaps
we have been slow to cope with life in the metropolis because it
is so new on the American scene. We struggle to solve the new
problems of a metropolitan nation using old institutions suited
to a simpler past. As one expert said to the Commission:
"Small wonder we have an urban crisis; we are still trying to
learn to live in this new demographic and technological
world."1

This country has experienced a demographic revolution in
population distribution as well as in national population growth.
Today, 69 percent of the American people live in metropoli-
tan areas — cities of 50,000 or more, and the surrounding
county or counties that are economically integrated with the
city. Between 1960 and 1970, the population of the United
States grew 1 3 percent, while the metropolitan population grew
23 percent.2 Nearly all metropolitan growth took place through
the growth of suburbs and territorial expansion into previously
rural areas. The United States has become mainly a nation of
cities and their environs.

The surroundings in which metropolitan people live vary
considerably, ranging from inner city to open country. And the
metropolitan influence, through the highway and communica-
tions systems, affects people far beyond the central cities and
adjacent counties. Distinctions between rural and urban people
are diminishing. Some "urban" people reside in the country-
side, and "rural" people can be found in the poverty areas of
our cities.

Metropolitan population growth is a basic feature of the
social and economic transformation of the United States — the
transition from an agrarian, to an industrial, and now to a
service-oriented economy. Metropolitan growth is the geo-
graphical dimension of these changes. Reflected in this process
are increases in the productivity of agriculture, and the new
dominance of commercial, professional, and industrial activi-
ties that thrive where people, equipment, money, and know-
how are concentrated in space. It is a universal experience. As
one of our consultants observed:

The concentration of national population within limited
areas of national territory appears to be characteristic of
practically all developed countries. It has little to do with
overall population size or density . . . but rather is a
reflection of the massive reorientation of population
growth and life styles associated with the industrial and
technological revolutions of the last two centuries. Enor-
mous changes in modes of population settlement, land use,
and resource exploitation accompany these revolutions.3

Metropolitan growth is the form that national and regional
population growth have taken. The national population grew
by 24 million in the 1960's. The metropolitan population grew
by more than 26 million, while the nonmetropolitan population
declined as migration continued, rural areas became suburban,
and many smaller cities grew to metropolitan size. The states
with rapid population growth — for example, California, Flori-
da, and Arizona — have been states with rapid growth of
metropolitan population. The regional shifts in population,
from north to west and south, from the midcontinent to the
coasts, have been focused in rapidly growing metropolitan
areas.

The process has brought efficiency and confusion, affluence
and degradation, individual advancement and alienation. The
buildup of transport and communications has made possible
increased contact and exchange, increased concentration and
dispersal, and increased segregation of activities and people.

While the metropolitan economy has reached new heights of
productivity, the people who staff it, their families, and the
businesses and roads that serve them, have settled miles and
miles of formerly rural territory, creating a new enlarged com-
munity— a real city with common problems but no common
government to manage it. Minority migrants have found better
jobs and education, but in so doing have traded the isolation
imposed by rural racism for the isolation of the inner city and
the institutional racism of metropolitan America. And, the
growth and dispersion of the metropolitan population has
brought wholly new problems of environmental management
as well as social organization.

Population growth is metropolitan growth in the contem-
porary United States, and it means different things to different
people.

To the man in Los Angeles, it means rapid growth through-
out Southern California. The outcome is often unplanned and
haphazard development that falls far short of realizing the
full aesthetic potential of the climate and natural surroundings.
Tract housing developments are marked off by smoggy and
noisy expressways. It is the "good life" colliding with a fragile
environment under palm trees.

To a housewife in Nebraska, it means the loss of population
in her small farming town — it reached its peak population in
1920. Family, friends, and neighbors, particularly the young
and better trained, have moved away. Tax revenues are shrink-
ing and essential public services are becoming more limited.
She and her husband can remain where they are, but only at
the cost of a difficult and uncertain livelihood.

To a black person in Harlem, the process of metropolitan
growth means discrimination that keeps him in a ghetto area
with crumbling old apartments and abandoned houses. And,
it means that it is harder than ever to reach the jobs opening
up in the suburbs as companies shift their operations outward.

Each of these problems relates to a different part of the
country and a different set of circumstancces. All are related
to the evolution of a metropolitan America.

METROPOLITAN GROWTH4

In its geographical dimension, population growth has been
a dual process of concentration on a national scale and dis-
persion and expansion at the local level. More and more of

our people live in metropolitan areas. At the same time, the
greatest central cities have been losing population, and the
territory of metropolitan settlement has expanded even faster
than population. Consequently, average metropolitan densities
have declined somewhat.

The older industrial areas of the north were the first to
develop a high degree of metropolitan concentration. Two-
thirds of the northeast was urban in 1900; by 1970, this propor-
tion was four-fifths, and more than one of every two Ameri-
cans residing in a metropolitan area lived in the north. Re-
cently, however, the north has lost much of its magnetism.
Instead, the most rapid growth has been in the south and west
where migration, supplementing growth from natural increase,
has produced high metropolitan and regional growth rates.

In 1900, more than four-fifths of the south was rural. By
1970, over half was metropolitan. The Atlanta area grew 37
percent during the 1960's. In Texas, the metropolitan popula-
tion grew 24 percent from 1960 to 1970 and accounted for
virtually all of the state's growth. At the end of the decade,
three-fourths of the state population was metropolitan. In the
west, the Arizona metropolitan population grew 42 percent
from 1960 to 1970. Migration contributed as much to Ari-
zona's growth as did natural increases — the balance of births
over deaths. Over 80 percent of the growth was concentrated
in the state's two metropolitan areas — Phoenix and Tucson —
so that in 1970 three-fourths of the population was metro-
politan. Migration accounted for half of California's growth
in the 1960's; but, by the end of the decade, there were signs
that the annual net migration from other states was very low
if not zero. Still, because past migrants included so many
young adults at the beginning of their childbearing years, state
growth remained high. The degree of metropolitan concentra-
tion in California was also high. In 1970, it was the highest in
the nation at 93 percent.

The most rapid growth in the past decade occurred in
metropolitan areas with populations of one to two million. As
a class, these areas grew an average of 27 percent, twice the
rate for the total population of the United States. Thirteen of
the 21 areas in this size class are in the south and west, and
all areas of this size that grew more than 27 percent are in the
south and west. (See table on page 27.)

The 12 areas having more than two million people grew
at an average rate of 12 percent, slightly under the rate for the
total population of the United States. As a class, they grew
just enough to retain their natural increase. Because they are
so large, their slow growth rate nonetheless resulted in the

addition of six million people. These large areas are mainly
the old urban centers of the north. Of the 12 areas in this
class, only Los Angeles and San Francisco are in the west,
and only Baltimore and Washington are in the south.

Metropolitan
Area Popula-
tion, 1970

Number of

Areas,

1970

Population

in 1970

Boundaries

(millions)

Population Increase,

1960 to 1970

(in 1970 boundaries)

Number Percent

(Millions) (Increase)

All Areas

243

139

20 14

2,000,000 or more

6 12

1,000,000 to 2,000,000

6 27

600,000 to 1,000,000

3 18

250,000 to 500,000

3 16

Under 250,000

118

2 14

Source: U. S. Bureau of the Census, Census of Population and Housing:
1970, General Demographic Trends for Metropolitan Areas, 1960 to 1970,
Final Report PHC(2), 1971. The figures shown in this table differ somewhat
from those cited elsewhere in the text due to differences in areal definitions.
If one compares the population of metropolitan areas as defined in 1960 to
the corresponding population within areas as defined in 1970, there is an
increase of 26 million people. But, if we look at growth occurring within
fixed metropolitan boundaries as defined in 1970, as in this table, there is
an increase of 20 million. The latter figure does not allow for territorial ex-
tension of existing areas or the growth of additional areas to metropolitan
status between 1960 and 1970.

SOURCES OF METROPOLITAN GROWTH5

The total metropolitan population grew by 26 million in
the 1960's. About one-third of this growth was from territorial
expansion of existing centers and the emergence of other
communities into metropolitan status; two-thirds was the re-
sult of population growth within constant boundaries.

Within metropolitan boundaries as defined in 1960, 74 per-
cent of growth was natural increase — the excess of births over
deaths — and 26 percent was net migration, consisting of im-
migrants as well as migrants from nonmetropolitan areas of
the United States. As the nonmetropolitan population becomes
a smaller fraction of the nation's total, its relative importance
as a source of migration declines. If current trends continue,
other parts of the United States will contribute four million
migrants to the metropolitan population between now and
the year 2000, while immigrants will add about 10 million.6

The dominance of natural increase and the smaller role of

migration show how far metropolitan growth has advanced.
When two-thirds of the people are metropolitan, their fertility
has a greater effect on the growth of metropolitan population
than does migration from nonmetropolitan areas. Natural in-
crease is the dominant source of metropolitan growth because
we have had so much migration to metropolitan areas in
the past.

MIGRATION

We are a geographically mobile society. Expansion and
movement have been central themes in a history in which
metropolitan growth is but a recent chapter.

Migration is basically a process of adjustment. For the in-
dividual, it represents a personal adjustment to changing life
circumstances and opportunities. For most of us, moving has
led to better things. Whether across town or across the coun-
try, movement provides access to areas of greater opportunity.
Immobility of people often reflects their isolation from oppor-
tunities available in the mainstream of society — social, eco-
nomic, and political.

For the nation as a whole, migration helps achieve a balance
between social and economic activities on the one hand and
population numbers on the other. As we move about the
country, our actions create broad social, economic, and politi-
cal realignments, as well as adjustments in our personal lives.
Balance is achieved through three broad types of movement:
( 1 ) the shift from economically depressed regions, often rural,
to areas of expanding employment and higher wages, usually
metropolitan; (2) the movement of the population within
metropolitan areas — the flight from the central city to the
suburbs — historically an adjustment to changing housing needs
and a desire for more space; and (3) the system of migration
flows among metropolitan areas by which migrants participate
in a nationwide job market, moving to areas offering economic
advancement and often personal environmental preferences.

Nearly 40 million Americans, or one in five, change homes
each year. Roughly one in 15 — a total of 13 million people —
migrates across a county line.7 These rates have remained
virtually unchanged over the quarter century for which data
are available. In part because of the relative decline in rural
population, the majority of people moving to metropolitan

areas, especially those moving long distances, are now com-
ing from other urban areas.

Whether it is a short or a long haul, those who move are
typically the better educated, more skilled young adults, seek-
ing a better life. Nearly a third of all migrants are in their
twenties, and they bring with them young children: A tenth
of all migrants are between the ages of one and four.

Migration, then, represents more than the numbers suggest.
Where five million young adults take their young children and
reproductive potential each year affects where future popula-
tion growth will take place, and where heavy demands for
housing and health and educational services will be felt. It
also determines where some of our most capable young people,
with most of their productive lives ahead, will contribute to
the nation's future.

Especially since World War II, metropolitan migrations
have included large numbers of blacks. Their transition from
rural to metropolitan life has been faster, more recent, and
more extensive than that of whites; 74 percent of the black
population of the United States is now metropolitan, com-
pared with 68 percent of whites. Blacks, more than whites,
tend to live in the larger metropolitan areas, and four-fifths
of them live in the central cities.8

Recent streams of migration among regions also have varied
substantially by race. In the 1960's, there was a net movement
of whites out of the north, to the west and south. Blacks
moved from the south to the north and west. The net effect
was an exchange of population between the north and south,
with the west experiencing net in-migration of both whites
and blacks. In the south, it was the nonmetropolitan areas
that experienced the heaviest outmigration of blacks. The
main areas receiving white in-migrants were Florida, the
Washington-Baltimore area, and large metropolitan areas
in Texas.9

LOCAL VARIATIONS

Differences in migration produce large differences in the
rates at which individual metropolitan areas grow. The Wash-
ington, D.C. area, for example, grew 39 percent in the 1960's,
but Pittsburgh's population declined. Although the total metro-
politan population of Texas grew 24 percent, three-fifths of
its metropolitan areas grew slowly or not at all.10

Most migrants to an individual area come from other
metropolitan areas. What is happening is that a small number
of areas are attracting a disproportionate number of people
moving from one metropolitan area to another. Between 1960
and 1965, some 60 metropolitan areas, accounting for 25 per-
cent of all the metropolitan population, drew migrants at a
rate at least twice that for the total system of metropolitan
centers, and absorbed nearly half of all metropolitan growth.
In this same period, 82 other metropolitan areas had more
people leaving than arriving. The population size of the fastest
growing areas ranged from small to very large, but the lion's
share of metropolitan growth was taken by the larger of these
fast-growing areas.11

With the drying up of nonmetropolitan sources of migra-
tion and a general decline in the rate of natural increase,
migration among metropolitan centers might result in some
60 to 80 metropolitan areas actually losing population by
1980. Many others would simply not grow. We indicate later
in this report why we believe that the usual apprehensions
over this prospect are ill-founded. But we also believe that
far more research is needed to understand the potential conse-
quences of such trends.

RURAL AREAS AND SMALL TOWNS

Over the decades, there has been an immense transfer of
population and reproductive potential through migration from
town and countryside to urban areas. The total rural popula-
tion in 1900 was 46 million, or 60 percent of the population
of the United States. Seventy years later, rural population had
risen by only eight million to a total of 54 million, while the
total national population had nearly tripled. By 1970, the
rural population was only 26 percent of the total.12

High fertility rates in rural areas would have produced
pressures for outmigration in any event. But the mechaniza-
tion of agriculture made a small number of workers very
productive, reduced the job market, and added to migration
pressures. Since 1940, the farm population has dropped from
32 million to less than 10 million. Today, farmers, farm
workers, and their families are only five percent of the nation's
population.13

Early in the century, those who moved were mainly white —
the children of rural immigrants of the late 19th century, and

people from Appalachia, the Ozarks, and other depressed
rural areas. More recently, there was the great movement of
rural blacks from the south to the largest cities of the north
and west.

Most migrants, regardless of race, bettered themselves eco-
nomically, and in terms of their standard of living. In a recent
government survey, most said their move was a success: They
were better off financially, and were happier as a result of
the move.

Here is Mrs. Mariah Gilmore, aged 60, who lived in the
tiny hamlet of De Vails Bluff, 30 miles from Little Rock until
her husband died in 1967:

I was without an income. After his death, I looked for
work, but was unable to find anything other than ironing,
which didn't pay enough money to maintain a house and
buy groceries, too.

There were months that I might pick or chop cotton, but
due to this being seasonal work, I couldn't make a living
... I had to come to Little Rock to see about finding a
job because I didn't have nothing to live on.14

Mrs. Gilmore found a job as a maid in a hotel for $35 a
week. She also found her way into a federally funded work-
training program operated by Pulaski County. She was even-
tually able to take a better position at the University of Arkan-
sas Medical Center in Little Rock. Although she improved
her economic status, Mrs. Gilmore confesses she would really
prefer to live in DeValls Bluff, if she could have the same job.
DeValls Bluff is still home to her.

The migration from rural areas has been such that in the
past decade nearly half of all counties lost population. These
losses occurred in a belt from Canada to the Rio Grande be-
tween the Mississippi River and the Rockies, in the deep
south, and in the Appalachian Mountains. For example, four-
fifths of the counties in West Virginia declined in population
in the 1960's, with virtually all counties losing population
through net outmigration. West Virginia lost one-third of its
people in their twenties by migration during the decade.

The territory involved in this rural exodus is immense; but,
relative to the national population, the number of people
leaving is small. The growth of the nation has been so great
that even if all rural counties were repopulated to their his-
torical maximum, they would absorb a population equivalent
to no more than five years of national growth.15

Nationally, decline in the farm population has been offset

by growth in the nonfarm rural population, made possible by
growth in nonfarm employment. These people now outnumber
the farm population by five to one. If this employment trend
should spread, rural population may begin to stabilize in some
areas where depopulation has been the rule. Such signs are
already apparent, as in the recent reversal of the trend in
Arkansas.

Paralleling the decline in the rural percentage of population
has been a decline in the proportion of the population located
in towns and cities of less than 50,000. Population growth
has pushed many of these places into the metropolitan cate-
gory, but others have lost population. Such is the history of
many small towns in Iowa and the Dakotas. In such towns,
population decline reflects a national system that increasingly
requires critical minimum concentrations of economic activ-
ities in one location. Lacking adequate roads, power lines,
sewers, proximity to large urban centers, and other advantages
that would attract new kinds of economic activity and revive
growth, they suffer from chronic high-level unemployment and
a shrinking economic base. This triggers outmigration, mainly
of the young and better educated, and leaves behind an older
population that is disadvantaged in terms of education and
training and less likely to depart, even in the face of economic
hardship. In this case, migration removes surplus population,
but it also tends to weaken further the town's competitive
position. The future of these places and, more important, the
future of the people who live in them, present problems that
need continued government attention.

Yet this decline is far from universal. More than half of all
nonmetropolitan municipalities grew during each of the last
three decades. Between 1940 and 1970, the number of non-
metropolitan places increased from 12,800 to 13,800 and
their total population grew from 23 to 33 million. An increas-
ing percentage of this population is in places over 10,000.
The places closest to metropolitan areas were more likely to
grow than those situated in remote locations.16

Nor is it clear that population growth is good for all small
towns or cities any more than for all metropolitan areas. For
some types of activities, recreation for example, many rural
areas may already have more people than desirable, even
though density and population size are well below urban levels.
The typical small college town, which has experienced rapid
growth in the last decade, might well benefit from stabilization
of its population as college enrollment levels off.

The continued growth of some small towns and cities, and
the vitality of others whose populations are not growing, chal-

lenge the popular notion that small town life is disappearing.
On the other hand, the association between growth and prox-
imity to a metropolitan center indicates that many of the
small towns are growing because they are part of an extensive
metropolitan area whose influence goes beyond the census-
defined boundaries. Although rural in physical setting, the
life style is urban. Many of these areas have become part of
the process of metropolitan growth and dispersal.

METROPOLITAN DISPERSAL

The territory of metropolitan America has expanded even
faster than its population. Roads and communications extend
the reach of today's metropolitan areas deep into their hinter-
land. Villages and towns become part of the city-system, grow,
and the metropolis expands. At the same time, internal
changes sharpen differences within areas. Major variations in
ethnic diversity, environmental hazard, socioeconomic status,
and income, as well as in fertility and mortality exist within
rather than between metropolitan areas. Moreover, the most
extensive depopulation in the contemporary United States is
occurring in central cities of metropolitan areas.

Fifteen of the 21 central cities with a 1960 population of
one-half million or more had lost population by 1970.17 In
fact, declining central cities lost more people in the 1960's
than were lost by declining rural counties. Over half the
1970 metropolitan population lived outside the central city,
and suburban areas captured almost all the metropolitan
growth during the decade. Continuing dispersal and expansion
means that the density of the central cities and of the great
metropolitan areas as a whole is falling slightly as the border
gets pushed further and further outward.

The territorial expansion of metropolitan areas has resulted
from the movement of business and the more affluent and
white population out of the central city, and from a shift in
the locus of new growth — residential, industrial, commercial
— to the expanding periphery. These changes have been so
pervasive that many suburban areas now provide all the basic
services and facilities generally found in the city — shopping,
jobs, and entertainment, as well as residences. The suburban
resident has a decreasing need to come into the city. Many
work at industries along the beltways circling many cities.

Others, particularly white-collar workers, commute daily to
the city, but otherwise live essentially a suburban life.

Simultaneous with this dispersal has been the concentration
of the black population in the central city, entrenching the
already established pattern of racial separation. Even among
relatively affluent blacks, the proportion living in the suburbs
is low compared to their white counterparts. In the 1960's, the
black population increased by a third. By 1970, 41 percent of
metropolitan whites and 78 percent of metropolitan blacks
lived in central cities. Suburbs continued to be almost totally
white. Six central cities were over 50 percent black, and this
number is expected to increase over the next decade.18

Outside the central city there is an extensive sorting-out
process. Suburban communities typically are internally homo-
geneous, but differ from one another along social and economic
lines, with the rich in some, the less affluent in others. Varia-
tions among suburbs are becoming as important as those be-
tween the central city and suburbs as a whole.

These processes — expansion and differentiation — pose crit-
ical problems for the contemporary United States. They do so
in part because of the multiplicity of governmental jurisdictions
encompassed and created by the expanding metropolis, and
because of the ease with which the city line becomes the
border between "them" and "us."

The first problem is racial and economic separation — blacks
and the poor in the inner city, whites and the better off in the
suburbs. While job opportunities have been moving to subur-
ban areas, the disadvantaged remain locked in declining areas
of the central city. These areas have many of the same charac-
teristics as the depopulating rural areas: a population with low
skills and inadequate education, deteriorating and abandoned
housing, poor public facilities. Conditions are aggravated by
selective outmigration. Those who can, leave. Those unable to
cope with the problems of social and economic isolation
remain.

The demography of racial separation is grim. Blacks and
other nonwhites, now 22 percent of central-city populations,
are projected to comprise about 40 percent by the year 2000.1&
Long before this average is reached by all cities, it will have
been surpassed by many. At least in a geographical sense, the
"two societies" envisioned by the Kerner Commission are
emerging.

A second problem is the relationship of the "real city" — the
functionally integrated metropolitan area — to the legal entities
that are supposed to govern it. Since the turn of the century,

the legal boundaries of the central city have remained relatively
fixed, while the functional city has expanded to include many
suburban jurisdictions as well. The Secretary of the Depart-
ment of Housing and Urban Development recently referred to
this problem, pointing to the need to deal with problems of
transportation, housing, and location of jobs in relation to
other daily activities at the metropolitan level.20 Instead, we are
trying to cope with the problems arising from a new form of
collective living — metropolitan — with a fragmented political
structure suited to the needs of an earlier era. Disparities exist
between the resources and responsibilities of different units of
local government. Core cities with limited and sometimes
shrinking tax bases are still responsible for needy elements of
the population — the elderly, poor, unemployed, and nonwhite
— left behind by the suburban exodus.

A third problem lies in the expanding periphery of metro-
politan areas. During the rapid expansion of suburban areas
since World War II, we failed to plan for anticipated growth;
instead, we allowed it to spread at will. Whether or not we are
past a population explosion, it is clear that the land-use explo-
sion of "spread city" is currently in full bloom. In the 1970's
and 1980's, the baby-boom generation will marry, have chil-
dren, and set up house in the suburbs, creating a tremendous
demand for the conversion of rural land to urban use. Without
proper efforts to plan where and how future urban growth
should occur, and without strong governmental leadership to
implement the plans, the problems of sprawl, congestion, in-
adequate open space, and environmental deterioration will
grow on an ever-increasing scale.

PUBLIC ATTITUDES

Partly because of the problems of urban living, partly as an
expression of nostalgia for what is perceived as the "good old
days," and perhaps partly in anguish over the condition of
modern life — for whatever reasons — Americans express dis-
satisfaction with the city and think something should be done.
When asked where they would prefer to live, they show pro-
nounced preferences for small towns and rural areas. Follow-
ing are some of the results from our survey of public infor-
mation and attitudes:

Where do you
live now?
(Percent)

Where would you

prefer to live?

(Percent)

Open Country

Small Town or City

Medium-Sized City or Suburb

Larger City or Suburb

Total

100

source: National Public Opinion Survey conducted for the Commission by
the Opinion Research Corporation, 1971.

Thus, 34 percent of people surveyed said they would prefer to
live in open country, but only 12 percent of them were classi-
fied as actually living there now.21 These results correspond to
the results of many similar national surveys. What do they
mean?

A recent survey of Wisconsin residents asked the same ques-
tions, but added a question on preferred proximity to a large
city. The results show a preference to live in smaller places
within commuting distance of a metropolitan central city. In
fact, if we take them at their word, 70 percent of the Wisconsin
survey respondents would prefer to live near a metropolitan
area, whereas only 54 percent now do.22

We do not know if the results of the Wisconsin survey reflect
national attitudes. If they do, it means people want the best of
both worlds — the serene and clean environment of rural areas
and the opportunity and excitement of the metropolis. Perhaps
it is not accidental that much metropolitan growth in fact
occurs in peripheral areas with a semi-rural environment. Iron-
ically, people moving to such areas typically find that they soon
lose their more desirable aspects — semi-rural areas rapidly
become suburban.

Even if current trends should prove to reflect majority pref-
erences, about one-fourth of the population in medium- and
large-sized metropolitan areas think that the place where they
live is too big. Over half of the population feel that the federal
government should "discourage further growth of large metro-
politan areas" or should "try to encourage people and industry
to move to smaller cities and towns." One-third disagree, and
the rest express no opinion. Americans are urban and becom-
ing more so, but many people evidently dislike the trend.23

WHERE DO THE TRENDS LEAD US?24

In 1970, about 71 percent of our population was metropoli-
tan; it is expected to be 85 percent by the year 2000. (The
census figure for 1970 was 69 percent. Our projections were
based on a modified definition of metropolitan areas; hence the
difference.)

Natural increase is the primary factor affecting the growth
of metropolitan population as a whole. To measure its effect,
we asked the Census Bureau to project growth within fixed
(1960) metropolitan boundaries, supposing there were no
additions to metropolitan population through territorial addi-
tions or migration from within the United States or from
abroad. Even assuming growth at the 2-child rate, we found
that the metropolitan population would grow by nearly 40
million people between 1970 and the year 2000, through natu-
ral increase alone.25 If to this we add migration, territorial
expansion of existing areas, and the growth of other centers to
metropolitan size, it is clear that a metropolitan future is
assured.

If the national population should grow at the 2-child rate,
projections based on recent trends indicate that there will be
225 million people living in metropolitan areas by the end of
the century. This would represent the addition of 81 million
people to the 144 million persons who comprised our metro-
politan population in 1970. An average of three children per
family would cause our metropolitan population to swell to
a total of 273 million by the year 2000, an increase of 129
million over the 1970 figure. Thus, our metropolitan popula-
tion at the end of the century will be nearly 50 million greater
if American families average three rather than two children.

Where will these people live? In 1970, more than four out
of every 10 Americans were living in a metropolitan area com-
prised of one million or more people. By the year 2000, the
projections indicate that more than six of every 10 persons
are likely to be living in these large areas. Not all of the addi-
tional people will be added to the 29 metropolitan areas of
one million or more that existed in 1970. In the year 2000,
there will be a total of 44 to 50 such places, depending on
how fast the total population grows. If present trends con-
tinue, the locus of continued increases in our total population
will be large metropolitan areas. This is to be expected so long

URBAN REGIONS:

f'ftlHO

WYOMING

UTAH ~^r

219

COLORADO ^

NORTH DAKOTA

SOUTH DAKOTA

NEW MEJUCO

KANSAS

S-j HAWAII

23 ^

9.
10.
11.
12.
13.

Metropolitan Belt
l.a. Atlantic Seabord
l.b. Lower Great Lakes
California Region
Florida Peninsula
Gulf Coast

East Central Texas— Red River
Southern Piedmont
North Georgia-South East Tennessee
Puget Sound
Twin Cities Region
Colorado Piedmont
. Saint Louis
Metropolitan Arizona
Willamette Valley

YEAR 2000

14. Central Oklahoma— Arkansas Valley

15. Missouri— Kau Valley

16. North Alabama

17. Blue Grass

18. Southern Coastal Plain

19. Salt Lake Valley

20. Central Illinois

21. Nashville Region
2 2. East Tennessee

23. Oahu island

24. Memphis

25. El Paso— Ciudad Juarez

Based on 2-child family projection
Jerome P. Pickard, "U. S. Metropolitan Growth and Expansion,

- _i! it y j e ^1 *-\ • ; . ■* t\T+ \

SOURCE

1970-2000, "With Population Projections

(prepared for the Commission, 1972)

as the total number of people in metropolitan areas keeps on
growing.

We tried to learn how much the growth of the large metro-
politan areas might be reduced if the growth of smaller, less
congested places were stimulated. Commission researchers
picked 121 places ranging in size from 10,000 to 350,000
whose growth in the past decade indicated that they might be
induced to grow more rapidly in the future. They listed all
places of this size that had grown faster than the national
average during the 1960's and were located more than 75
miles from any existing or projected metropolitan area of two
million people or more.

Such places had a total population of 14 million in 1970.
If they were to grow by 30 percent each decade, their popula-
tion in the year 2000 would be about 31 million. If this were
to happen, our calculations suggest that these places might
absorb about 10 million of the growth which is otherwise ex-
pected to occur in areas of one million or more, assuming the
2-child national projection. However, these large areas would
still increase by 70 million under the 2-child projection, and
by 115 million under the 3-child projection. If the smaller
areas were to grow faster than 30 percent, they would, of
course, divert more growth from the large areas. But to obtain
substantial effects, these smaller places would have to grow
50 percent per decade.26 At that point, one must ask if the
cure is any better than the disease.

Moreover, most of the smaller areas which are capable of
attracting many people are in urban regions, or would be by
the year 2000. Thus, stimulating their growth would have the
useful effect of decongesting settlement in urban regions, but
would do little to retard urban region growth.

URBAN REGIONS27

The evolution of urban communities has proceeded from
farm, to small town, to city, to large metropolitan area. It is
now proceeding to the urban region — areas of one million
people or more comprised of a continuous zone of metropoli-
tan areas and intervening counties within which one is never
far from a city. The reach of the urban economy has so in-
creased that the most logical scale at which to grasp the trend
is at the urban region level.

There have been tremendous changes in the geographic

scale at which we live. Transportation technology, particu-
larly our extensive highway system, permits us to move great
distances within a short period. Some people commute daily
between New York and Boston or Washington. Urban people
in search of open space and recreation travel considerable dis-
tances to enjoy a weekend camping trip. A century ago, Cen-
tral Park was the city park for New York. Now the "city" is
the urban region along the Atlantic seaboard and its park
is the Shenandoah National Park on Skyline Drive. It is per-
haps a weekend park, not one visited daily; but, on a three-
day weekend, the license plates on visiting cars will be from
Pennsylvania, New York, D.C., and Virginia. The scale at
which we live is expanding well beyond formal metropolitan
boundaries. In the future, our daily experience may well reach
out into the far corners of urban regions and beyond.

An urban region is not a single "supercity"; it is a regional
constellation of urban centers and their hinterland. Although
substantial portions are comprised of more or less continuous
geographic settlement, the urban region offers — and continues
to provide — a variety of residential settings within the func-
tional sphere of a metropolitan economy. This mosaic of
environments ranges from rural (southern New Hampshire
or Indio, California) to cosmopolitan (Chicago or Los An-
geles). Such environments coexist within a common func-
tional framework without intruding spatially on each other.
Even in the largest urban region, running along the Atlantic
coast from Maine to Virginia, and westward past Chicago, it
is estimated that only one-fifth of die area is currently in
urban use.

These regions grow not only through the increase of popu-
lation but by geographic expansion. In effect, they are a prod-
uct of the automobile era and new communication technology
which encouraged the outward movement of industries and
residences from the city proper. Density within these regions
has remained relatively constant and low, even though popu-
lation size has increased.

Urban regions appear to be a prominent feature of the
demographic future of this country. In 1920, there were 10
urban regions with over one-third of the total population.
By 1970, about three-fourths of the population of the United
States lived in the urban regions which already exist or are
expected to develop by 2000.

The total land area encompassed by urban regions is esti-
mated to double in the period 1960 to 1980, while the num-
ber of such areas is expected to increase from 16 to at least 23.
By 2000, urban regions will occupy one-sixth of the conti-

EXPANSION OF URBAN REGIONS

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1960

1980

2000

The territory of urban regions is doubling in the period 1960 to 1980. By the
year 2000, urban regions will encompass one-sixth of the United States land
area (excl. Alaska and Hawaii).

source: Jerome P. Pickard, "U. S. Metropolitan Growth and Expansion, 1970-
2000, With Population Projections" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

nental United States land area, and contain five-sixths of our
nation's people. (See bar graph above.)

If our national population distributes itself according to
these projections, 54 percent of all Americans will be living
in the two largest urban regions. The metropolitan belt
stretching along the Atlantic seaboard and westward past
Chicago would contain 41 percent of our total population.
Another 13 percent would be in the California region lying
between San Francisco and San Diego. (See map on pages 38-
39.)

Even if the broad trends have been projected accurately,
the experiences of individual metropolitan areas may differ
considerably from the estimates prepared for us. Within the
general system of metropolitan centers, some will probably
stabilize or decline; others, having a disproportionate number
of young people, or attracting much migration, will continue
to grow rapidly, even if national population stabilizes. Finally,
there may well be new frontiers of growth that have not yet
been established or discovered by social scientists. Our pro-

jections, then, should be taken as a description of a possible
future — one that is essentially the outcome of trends now
observable — but not as a prediction of what will happen or
a prescription of what is desirable.

POPULATION STABILIZATION, MIGRATION,
AND DISTRIBUTION

How would stabilization of the national population affect
migration and local growth? First, shifts in population com-
position— chiefly age and family structure — would alter the
tempo of migration. Second, changes in the balance between
natural increase and migration would influence local growth.
Because of the momentum of past growth and the time it will
take to achieve a stabilized population in the United States,
the full effects will be long range.

An older population with smaller families would be slightly
less mobile. Long-distance moves would be relatively less
numerous because of the decline in the proportion of the pop-
ulation aged 20 to 24, which is most apt to move. Smaller
families would reduce the need of repeated residential moves,
since such moves are often an adjustment to changing hous-
ing needs.

Perhaps the most significant effect of population stabiliza-
tion on the distribution of population is the most obvious:
Zero growth for the nation will mean an average of zero
growth for local areas. It may be that the most effective long-
term strategy for stabilizing local growth is through national
stabilization, not redistribution.

Stabilization would slow the growth of the largest metro-
politan centers, which are already growing only at the same
rate as the nation, and it would shift somewhat more of the
available growth to small- and intermediate-size centers. Re*
placement-level fertility would mean that migration in and out
of a metropolitan area would be an extremely important com-
ponent of local growth; and continued selective growth
through migration would tend to accentuate uneven growth
among different metropolitan areas. Natural increase would
no longer balance out net outmigration, so a significant num-
ber of metropolitan areas could be expected to lose population.

However, even if the population of our country were to stop
growing today, we would still have problems associated with
rural depopulation and metropolitan growth. Our large metro-

politan areas would still have problems of congestion, pollu-
tion, and severe racial separation.

According to the Commission's survey, 54 percent of
Americans think that the distribution of population is a "seri-
ous problem"; half believe that, over the next 30 years, it will
be at least as great a problem as population growth.28 This is
in accordance with our belief that to reduce problems of popu-
lation growth in no way absolves us of the responsibility to
address the problems posed by the distribution of population.

CHAPTER 4. THE ECONOMY

Does a healthy economy require a growing population?
Would slower population growth hurt business or threaten
workers' jobs? Would it help? How would the average person
fare in economic terms if the rate of population growth ap-
proached zero?*

We have conducted research to determine what effects dif-
ferent rates of population growth are likely to have on the
economic well-being of the nation. We compared the effects
of the 2-child population projection with the effects of the
3-child projection. Our overall conclusions from this research
are:

1. Major economic changes are on the horizon regardless
of future changes in population growth rates.

2. The nation has nothing to fear from a gradual approach
to population stabilization.

3. From an economic point of view, a reduction in the
rate of population growth would bring important benefits,
especially if the United States develops policies to take advan-
tage of the opportunities for social and economic improve-
ment that slower population growth would provide.

♦Separate statements by Commissioners Otis Dudley Duncan, with
Paul B. Comely, M.D., concurring (pp. 274-275), John R. Meyer (p.
288), and James S. Rummonds (pp. 305-307), appear on the indicated
pages.

INCOME

Between now and the year 2000, increases in the produc-
tivity of workers are likely to result in such a large rise in
average income that styles of life in the year 2000 will be
qualitatively different from what they are today. It is expected
that by the year 2000 average family income, now about
$12,000, will exceed $21,000, in terms of today's dollars.1
This is the projection, even if the work week were reduced to
30 hours, and even if the population grew at the 3-child rate.

The average individual's consumption is expected to be
more than twice what it is today, whether the population
grows at the 2-child or the 3-child rate. As income increases,
people show an increased preference for services, such as edu-
cation and health services, as compared with manufactured
goods. So, the population of the year 2000 will boost its con-
sumption of services faster than its consumption of manu-
factured goods.

The rate of population growth will have a significant effect
on per capita income. Our research indicates that in the year
2000, per capita income may be as much as 15 percent higher
under the 2-child than under the 3-child population growth
rate. The main reason for the higher per capita income under
the 2-child projection is the shift in the age composition re-
sulting from slower population growth; as we saw earlier,
people of working age will constitute a larger fraction of the
total population under conditions of slower population growth.
A secondary reason is that with lower birthrates the percent-
age of women in the labor force is expected to rise somewhat
faster than it would otherwise. Taken together, these trends
mean relatively more workers and earners, and relatively fewer
mouths to feed.

The age effect arises from the fact that population replaces
itself from the bottom up; and, if it is growing, it is adding
more and more at the base of the age pyramid. However,
growth in the population of working age is drawn from the
smaller numbers of births that occurred 15 to 20 years earlier.
When growth slows, it slows first at the base, and before long
we see a narrowing of the difference between the number of
births and the numbers annually entering the working ages.
The ratio of workers to youthful dependents rises, the income
they produce is spread among fewer people, and the average

income available per person in the population consequently
increases.

Of course, the same process eventually causes a rise in the
percentage of old people in the population — those who have
passed working age. But because of higher death rates at these
ages, the increase in aged dependency offsets only part of the
decline in youth dependency, and the overall result is still a
major drop in total dependency and an increase in income
available per person in the population.

ECONOMIC GROWTH
AND THE QUALITY OF LIFE

The use of income or output per capita as an indicator of
the quality of life has been criticized on a number of grounds.
One such criticism is made by people who are concerned
about environmental deterioration. They maintain that higher
output levels for the economy as a whole will cause a greater
drain on natural resources and more pollution.

Accordingly, we examined the effects that the 2- and 3-
child growth rates would have on GNP — the gross national
product — which measures the total volume of goods and serv-
ices produced. GNP is expected to more than double by the
year 2000, whether the population grows rapidly or slowly.2
This is the prospect implied by the projected increases in per
capita income and the further growth of population resulting
from the baby boom.

However, if families average three children in the future,
GNP will grow far more than if they average two children.
In the year 2000, the difference in GNP resulting from differ-
ent population assumptions amounts to as much as one-fourth
of the total GNP today. Rapid population growth will cause
more rapid growth in the size of the economy, and correspond-
ingly greater demands on resources and the environment
People will not be better off economically with more rapid
population growth — we have already seen that income per
person is higher under the slower population growth assump-
tion. Rather, increases in the number of people simply multi-
ply the volume of goods and services produced and consumed.
In the next chapter, we examine the meaning of these trends
for resource consumption and deterioration of the environ-
ment.

POVERTY

Income or output per capita is an average, and it conceals
some gross disparities. We need to be concerned with these,
especially at the lower end of the income scale — the people
in poverty.

We have estimated the effects that slower population growth
would have on poverty in the United States in the year 2000.
We have found that the general improvement in average in-
come associated with slower population growth would assist
in reducing poverty, but would not eliminate it. This is not
good enough.

There are today, by official estimate, 26 million Americans
living in poverty conditions.3 This is 13 percent of our popu-
lation. Improvements in the average income of the population
do something for these groups, but not enough. Their problem
is that too many of them are not part of the system that gen-
erates and distributes income.

Over six million poor people are working adults who simply
do not make enough money to meet even the minimal official
income standard. Over three million of the poor are persons
aged 14 to 64 who are sick or disabled, in school, or unable
to find work. Nearly five million are over age 65, and over
eight million are children. Finally, more than two million are
female heads of family whose responsibilities at home keep
them from taking jobs.

What this adds up to is that more than nine out of 10 poor
people are excluded — because of age, incapacity, poor train-
ing, family responsibilities, fiscal disincentives, or discrimina-
tion in the labor market — from the system that produces and
distributes income and the things income buys. Real improve-
ments in their lot will be reflected in a changing distribution
of income. But, while average income has risen dramatically
and the number of poor has declined as a result, the relative
distribution of income has changed little in the 25 years the
Census Bureau has been measuring it.

In a country as wealthy and resourceful as ours, there is no
excuse for permitting deprivation. For the working poor and
those who cannot find work, the solution is to eliminate racial
and sex discrimination in employment, and to improve edu-
cation and training. Beyond this, we need a serious reexami-
nation of the status of the aged. Old people are healthier and

better educated than ever before. They are often forced to
stop working far before the end of their productive lives, be-
cause of outright discrimination and outdated restrictions
against older workers, and because of fiscal disincentives
against work built into our social security laws and other pen-
sion arrangements.

Nevertheless, the country still has a number of people who
cannot be helped by better access to the labor market. For
these, the answer should be an increased public responsibility
for maintaining a decent standard of living.

Measures to achieve an improved distribution of income
should be beneficial demographically as well as socially. Evi-
dence indicates that levels of childbearing — both wanted and
unwanted — decline as income rises.

LABOR FORCE GROWTH

Thirty-five million new workers will be seeking their first
job in the decade of the 1970's.4 That is seven million more
than in the 1960's. This is one of the legacies of the baby
boom. As that generation comes of age, swelling numbers of
job applicants put an extra burden on full employment policy.

The pressure should be off in the 1980's. The number of new
entrants to the labor force will probably be close to the figure
for the 1970's, due to declining birthrates in the past decade.
Once all the new entrants and women resuming work after
their children are grown are balanced out against withdrawals
through retirement and death, the labor force in 1990 should
number some 114 million, or 28 million more than the 1970
figure.

What happens thereafter depends mainly on the number of
births in the 1970's. If fertility should follow the 2-child pro-
jection, the number of people looking for their first job in the
1990's should be about the same as in the 1980's. However, if
fertility follows the 3 -child projection, the number of job seek-
ers in the 1990's will jump 10 million, to a total of around 44
million; and by the year 2000, the total labor force will number
some 136 million. Beyond 2000, the difference in labor force
growth between the two projections becomes immense.

It seems clear that labor-force trends under the 3 -child pro-
jection can be expected to generate greater pressure for in-
creased production, employment, and consumption, and corre-
spondingly greater problems associated with the social and

k49

environmental consequences of such increases. The 2-child
projection does not imply that these problems can be avoided,
only that they will be less pressing. It implies not only smaller
numbers to be accommodated, but also a context in which the
urgency of competing priorities will be muted.

We have seen that slower population growth causes a grad-
ual increase in the percentage of old people and a decline in the
percentage of youth — hence, a rising average age of the popu-
lation. The same process also causes the labor force to age.

Concerns have been expressed that an older labor force will
lack the energy, flexibility, and imagination of a younger one.
Despite the absence of evidence for these concerns, their ex-
istence is further reason to support programs desirable on other
grounds, such as the provision of continuing education of our
labor force. Indeed, in light of the rapid changes occurring in
all aspects of life, the idea that education should be completed
by the age of 18, 22, or even 30, is clearly out of date.

BUSINESS

Will a slower rate of population growth hurt specific indus-
tries, particularly those which cater to young people? Does it
threaten jobs?

While it is certainly true that there would be a faster increase
in the sales of certain products, for example baby foods and
milk, under conditions of higher population growth, it is also
true that other products and services, for example convenience
foods and airline travel, would be relatively favored by the
faster rise in per capita income associated with slower popula-
tion growth rates. More important, it does not appear, for
several reasons, that a lower population growth rate will cause
serious problems for any industry or its employees.5

First, regardless of the rate of population growth, total in-
come, and hence demand, will rise.

Second, slower population growth will actually cause total
as well as per capita income to be higher over the next 10 to 15
years than would a more rapid population growth rate. In other
words, during the next 10 to 15 years total GNP in the 2-child
projection would probably be slightly larger than in the 3-child
case.

Third, it is important to note that under the 2-child family
projection, there is no year in which there would be fewer
births than there were in 1971. In other words, a gradual ap-

proach to population stabilization would not reduce demand
from current levels for any industry we studied. (We studied
the effect of the 2-child and 3-child population projections on
demand for housing starts, mobile homes, domestic cars, im-
ported cars, men's suits, frozen foods, power boats, credit,
furniture and household equipment, food and beverages, beer,
clothing and shoes, steel, dishwashers, railroad travel, and
airline travel.)

Beyond the next 10 to 15 years, the adjustments businesses
must make to changes in consumer tastes and technological
developments should far exceed the problems of adjusting to a
lower population growth rate. The loom tender in the diaper
factory is hurt more by the competition from synthetic dis-
posables than by the recent decline in births. Large fluctuations
in birthrates will require larger adjustments by business than
will small ones; still, we can have fluctuations around a 3-child
as well as a 2-child growth rate. In declining communities,
small businesses will not do as well economically as they would
if there were more people around — some adjustments will be
required. But other changes that are unpredictable today will
require far more important adjustments by individuals, as well
as by entire industries.

Past experience should lead to confidence that such adjust-
ments can be made. Here is the Board Chairman of Atlantic-
Richfield, testifying at our public hearing in New York:

There is a habit of thinking in some segments of the busi-
ness community, of course, that population increase is
somehow essential to the maintenance of vigorous demand
and economic growth, just as there is an instinctive re-
action against any important new cost factors being added
to the processes of production and distribution. But our
economy has already, and in many ways, shown its tre-
mendous adaptability to new social demands and necessi-
ties. I have not the slightest doubt that it can meet this new
challenge.6

THE GROWTH MYSTIQUE

In short, we find no convincing economic argument for
continued national population growth. On the contrary, most
of the plusses are on the side of slower growth. This finding is
at variance with much opinion, especially in the business com-

munity and among many civic leaders. We have sought to find
the reason for this seeming contradiction.

Periods of rapid population growth in this country have
generally been periods of rapid economic expansion as well.
It is not surprising, therefore, that we associate population
growth with economic progress. However, the historical asso-
ciation of population growth with economic expansion would
be an erroneous guide to the formulation of population policy
for the future.

This connection reflects in large part the fact that periods of
rapid economic expansion attracted immigrants to our shores
and thus quickened population growth as a result. Additions to
population through immigration are far more stimulating to
economic growth than are additions by natural increase. This
is because, while babies remain dependent for many years
before beginning to contribute to output, many immigrants are
of working age and thus become immediately productive. Im-
migration made a major contribution to rapid population
growth up to World War I, but its effect since then has been
much diminished. In the years 1861 to 1910, the average an-
nual immigration rate per 1000 Americans was 7.5; the rate
for the period 1911 to 1970 dropped to 1.8. The rate for the
recent period reflects a rise from the 1930's, when there was a
net outflow of migrants, to the 1960's when the rate was 2.2.7

This answer may not satisfy the gas station owner, local food
retailer, or banker, to whom it seems obvious that "more
people" means more customers or more savings accounts. Once
again, however, we need to examine the kind of growth that
means more business, and its relationship to local economic
expansion. The rapid local population growth that means
more business results chiefly from other people moving in, not
more people being born and raised. Adults moving in make
ready customers and ready employees. They have grown up
elsewhere, their education has been paid for elsewhere, and
being young, they impose few of the demands of the dependent
aged. Since mobile people are, on the average, better qualified
than those who do not move, it is no surprise that they provide
an extra boost to local establishments.

We have studied the effects of lower national population
growth rates on the economic well-being of urban and rural
areas within the nation. Is there reason to fear that the ills
typical of areas of population decline today would become
more serious or widespread if national population growth rates
declined? We conclude that there is not; such fears are based
on a mistaken belief that population decline causes economic
decline. In reality, the chain of causation in distressed areas

runs from (1) the decline of regional competitive capability
to (2) unemployment to (3) net outmigration to (4) popula-
tion loss.8 Accordingly, there is little reason to suppose that
local problems of unemployment or obsolescence of physical
facilities would be more serious in a situation of zero or nega-
tive national population growth than they would be at any posi-
tive level of national population growth. In the future, as in
the past, areas of relatively high unemployment will tend to be
areas of relative population loss; but the relative population
loss will be the consequence and not the cause of local un-
employment.

The diminished burden of providing for dependents, and
for the multiplication of facilities to keep up with expanding
population, should make more of our national output avail-
able for many desirable purposes: new kinds of capital forma-
- tion, including human resources investment; public expendi-
ture involving qualitative improvement and modernization;
and greater attention to environmental and amenity objectives.
Thus, whatever the future problems of urban areas and re-
gions may be, we should have more ample per capita resources
to attack them in a situation with a lower rate of population
growth than we would have with a higher rate.

SUMMARY

We have looked for, and have not found, any convincing
economic argument for continued national population growth.
The health of our economy does not depend on it. The vitality
of business does not depend on it. The welfare of the average
person certainly does not depend on it.

In fact, the average person will be markedly better off in
terms of traditional economic values if population growth fol-
lows the 2-child projection rather than the 3-child one. Slower
growth will give us an older population, and this trend will
require adjustments well within the ability of the nation to
provide. Beyond this, however, we point out that the fruits
of slower population growth will be denied to those most in
need of them unless deliberate changes are made in distribu-
tion of income to those who lack it by reason of discrimina-
tion, incapacity, or age.

CHAPTER 5. RESOURCES AND
THE ENVIRONMENT

What are the likely future impacts of population growth
on the demand for resources and on the environment in the
United States? Here again, we have examined the conse-
quences of the population growing according to the 2-child
projection and the 3-child projection, and compared the re-
sults. For problems such as air pollution, where local con-
centrations are important, we have examined the implications
of population growth in local areas as well as in the nation as
a whole.

For several resource and environmental topics, we have ex-
tended the analysis beyond the year 2000 to the year 2020; in
so doing, we have identified some important effects that do
not become particularly noticeable in the shorter period. Be-
yond the next 50 years, we do not know enough to make quan-
titative projections. Nonetheless, it is obvious that there are
ultimate limits to growth. We live in a finite world. While its
limits are unknown because technology keeps changing them,
it is clear that the growth of population and the escalation of
consumption must ultimately stop. The only questions are
when, how, and at what level. The answers to these questions
will largely be determined by the course of world population
growth, including that of the United States.

Several general conclusions* emerge from our research:

*A separate statement by Commissioner Alan Cranston appears on
pages 267-268.)

1. Population growth is one of the major factors affecting
the demand for resources and the deterioration of the environ-
ment in the United States. The further we look into the future,
the more important population becomes.

2. From an environmental and resource point of view, there
are no advantages from further growth of population beyond
the level to which our past rapid growth has already com-
mitted us. Indeed, we would be considerably better off over
the next 30 to 50 years if there were a prompt reduction in our
population growth rate. This is especially true with regard to
problems of water, agricultural land, and outdoor recreation.

3. While the nation can, if it has to, find ways to solve the
problems growth creates, we will not like some of the solu-
tions we will have to adopt. With continued growth, we com-
mit ourselves to a particular set of problems: more rapid
depletion of domestic and international resources, greater pres-
sures on the environment, greater dependence on continued
rapid technological development to solve these problems, and
a more contrived and regulated society. So long as population
growth continues, these problems will grow and will slowly,
but irreversibly, force changes in our way of life. And there
are further risks: Increasing numbers press us to adopt new
technologies before we know what we are doing. The more
of us there are, the greater is the temptation to introduce solu-
tions before their side effects are known. With slower popula-
tion growth leading to a stabilized population, we gain time
to devise solutions, resources to implement them, and greater
freedom of choice in deciding how we want to live in the
future.

4. The American future cannot be isolated from what is
happening in the rest of the world. There are serious problems
right now in the distribution of resources, income, and wealth,
among countries. World population growth is going to make
these problems worse before they get better. The United States
needs to undertake much greater efforts to understand these
problems and develop international policies to deal with them.

HOW POPULATION AFFECTS RESOURCES
AND THE ENVIRONMENT

The pressure that this nation puts on resources and the
environment during the next 30 to 50 years will depend on
the size of the national population, the size of population in

local areas, the amounts and types of goods and services the
population consumes, and the ways in which these goods and
services are produced, used, and disposed of. All these factors
are important. Right now, because of our large population size
and high economic productivity, the United States puts more
pressure on resources and the environment than any other
nation in the world.

We have attempted to separate these factors and estimate
the impact of population on resources and the environment
using a quantitative model which shows the demand for re-
sources and the pollution levels associated with different rates
of economic and population growth. The seriousness of the
population-induced effects has then been assessed by evaluat-
ing the adequacy of resources to meet these requirements and
the environmental impacts of pollution.

In discussing the economy, we indicated that under any set
of economic projections, the total volume of goods and ser-
vices produced in the United States — the gross national prod-
uct— will be far larger than it is today. It is expected to be at
least twice its present size by the year 2000, and in 50 years,
with rapid population and economic growth, it could be seven
times as large as it is now. Regardless of future population
growth, the prospect is that increases in output will cause tre-
mendous increases in demand for resources and impact on the
environment.

What happens to population growth will nevertheless make
a big difference in the future size of the economy. In the year
2000, the difference in GNP resulting from the different popu-
lation assumptions could amount to one-fourth of today's
GNP. By the year 2020, this difference amounts to more than
the total size of today's GNP.

In short, total GNP, which is the principal source of the
demand for resources and the production of pollutants, will
become much larger than it is now. But if population should
grow at the 3 -child rate, GNP will grow far more than it will
at the 2-child rate.

MINERALS

In our research, we examined the demand for 19 major
nonfuel minerals: chromium, iron, nickel, potassium, cobalt,
vanadium, magnesium, phosphorous, nitrogen, manganese,

molybdenum, tungsten, aluminum, copper, lead, zinc, tin,
titanium, and sulfur.

Resource consumption will rise more slowly if population
grows more slowly. Our estimates indicate that the amount
of minerals consumed in the year 2000 would average nine
percent lower under the 2-child than under the 3-child popu-
lation projection. The difference in annual consumption would
be 17 percent in the year 2020, and would grow rapidly
thereafter.

Population growth exerts an important effect on resource
consumption compared with the effect of economic growth.
Our research shows that in the year 2000, if GNP per capita
were one percent less than projected, the consumption of most
minerals would be 0.7 to 1.0 percent less; the consumption
of four minerals — cobalt, magnesium, titanium, and sulfur —
would be reduced relatively more. In the year 2000, if popu-
lation were one percent less than projected, minerals consump-
tion would be 0.5 to 0.7 percent less. The population effect,
while substantial, is smaller because of an important offsetting
effect. As we saw earlier, slower population growth induces
higher output per person because of the favorable ratio of
labor force to total population. This offsets somewhat the
effect that smaller numbers have on the conservation of re-
sources.

While there are clear resource savings from slower popula-
tion growth, our research supports, with certain qualifications,
the view that the United States would have no serious diffi-
culty acquiring the supplies it needs for the next 50 years,
even if the population were to grow at the 3-child rate. This
is the prospect, even assuming, as we have done, that the
resource demands of the rest of the world grow more rapidly
than those of the United States, as has been the case in recent
years. Although growing demand may pose some problems
of adjustment, adequate supplies of all the minerals we studied
can be achieved through tolerable price increases. Price in-
creases will equalize supply and demand by stimulating ex-
ploration or imports (increased supply) and by stimulating
recycling and the use of more plentiful substitutes (reduced
demand). The earth's crust still contains immense quantities
of lower grade minerals which can be called into production
at levels of costs which we could afford to pay, even if the
demands of the rest of the world should rise as projected and
our population were to grow at the 3-child rate.

This expectation could be altered by several developments.
First, prices could fail to anticipate impending shortages; that
is, they might not rise long enough in advance to stimulate the

changes necessary to avert shortages. Second, mining opera-
tions are heavy polluters, and mineral needs could conflict
with environmental policy. Finally, and most serious, there
are worldwide imbalances in access to resources. While the
United States will remain among the "haves," relatively speak-
ing, disparities between world regions may affect international
power balances in ways that would involve us.

ENERGY

Energy makes the difference between poverty and affluence.
The reason per capita income in the United States is so high
| is that the average American worker has at his command
more energy, chiefly in the form of electricity, than any other
worker in the world. With energy we refine aluminum, make
rubber, shape steel, form new synthetic chemical compounds,
propel automobiles, and heat our homes.

How much energy we have available depends on the avail-
ability of the necessary fuels and on our ability to convert the
fuels to energy — the greatest advance in this regard was the
development of inexpensive methods of electricity produc-
tion. The technology of fuels acquisition and the technology
of energy conversion are both critical. So is purchasing power
— the ability to pay for domestic development of fuels or to
import them. The original inhabitants of North America oc-
cupied a continent rich in energy fuels. But they neither knew
how to get the fuels out of the ground nor how to convert
them to energy. Some modern countries with advanced means
of energy conversion lack their own fuel supplies; they buy
them from other countries.

The ability of the United States to meet its future energy
needs will be determined chiefly by developments in tech-
nology— the technology of conversion and the technology of
fuels acquisition. A major question will be whether we can
find methods that are environmentally safe. Virtually every
stage of energy use — fuel production, delivery, conversion,
and consumption — has a significant environmental impact.
For example, one-third of all coal is produced by strip min-
ing, and the consequence is a scarred landscape and severe
runoff into streams and rivers. Oil spills which contaminate
the oceans and beaches may result from offshore drilling.
Much airborne pollution comes from the use of such rela-
tively dirty fuels as coal and oil. Some scientists are beginning

to raise the possibility of thermal pollution resulting from
concentrated use of energy in local areas. Nuclear power gen-
eration requires the disposal of radioactive atomic wastes.
Because of these problems, the development of energy-produc-
tion capacity could be impaired.

The increase in our energy needs will be immense under
any projection, although not as large under the 2-child popu-
lation projection as under the 3-child projection. The relative
difference in energy demands under the different population
projections is about the same as for minerals, and it becomes
very large after the population with the lower rate of growth
stabilizes. Whether population growth will strain fuel sup-
plies, or cause serious environmental damage in the process of
acquiring and using the necessary fuels, depends on future
developments in technology.

With no major changes in technology, oil and gas supplies
could become a problem for the United States by the year
2000 — we would be importing more and paying higher prices;
and supplies would certainly be a problem for some world
regions. These problems could be averted if we found inexpen-
sive means of using such potential sources as oil shale and tar
sands, but using these sources is likely to have environmental
consequences as serious as those from the strip-mining of coal.
If we unlock the secrets of atomic fusion, we could have an
environmentally clean way of generating electricity, with no
fuel supply problem. The energy from converting the deuter-
ium contained in 30 cubic kilometers of sea water would equal
that of the earth's original supply of coal and petroleum.

Our review of the energy situation indicates that high prior-
ity ought to be given to research and development in clean
sources of energy production. The faster population grows,
the more urgent such breakthroughs become. We turn now to
several areas where population growth dominates other con-
siderations— where we cannot be hopeful about the ability of
purchasing power and technical development to avert popu-
lation problems.

WATER

Water requirements already exceed available flow in the
southwestern United States. Our research shows that growing
population and economic activity will cause the area of water

shortage to spread eastward and northward across the coun-
try in the decades ahead. Such deficits will spread faster if
population growth follows the 3-child projection than if it fol-
lows the 2-child projection. (See bar graph below and map
on pages 62-63.) This will occur despite large expenditures on
water treatment, dams, and reservoirs during the next 50 years.
Population growth will be more important than economic
growth in causing these growing problems.

Our national abundance of water does not change this pic-
ture significantly. If water could be shipped across the coun-
try like oil, coal, or manufactured goods, there would be no
problems of water shortage. But distances are so long and the
amounts of water used so huge, that it would be prohibitively
expensive to solve these regional problems by transfers of
water from surplus to deficit areas. Nor is there scope for suffi-
ciently large relocation of water users — people and indus-
tries— to regions where water is plentiful. An inexpensive
method of taking the salt out of seawater could solve the
problem, but such technology is not now available. Similarly,
artificial control of rain is not advanced enough to be used
to any significant extent. While little is known about the extent
of groundwater reserves, most experts do not consider the
mining of such reserves an adequate alternative.

On the other hand, there is wide scope for reducing use
through rationing and the adoption of water-conserving tech-

REGNNAL WATER SHORTAGES

MUIOMS Of OAUONS/OAY

tta am nu am tmm

13.9

1Z7

1980

23.1

35~?

2000

£3.0

110.5

2020

WATER DEFICIT REGIONS:

1960 1980 2000 2020

Estimates assume rapid ^noMcjro^^^^^^Z^ CoS
storage facilities, and tertiary treatment. Alaska ana nawau

mission's data did not include these states.

3-CHILD FAMILY

*w,

^ecoNSiN vX

.'40**

»<*«**,

[H*'

«S^

~76«*

nm**

-RJ

CONN

•

7 X\vV^W?vi!v \

X-.V MISSOURI If

f^y*U^

tV^oc

^W /Kitm*** /

^^^

V VTrkInsas

<i$S \^

-nj

^OUlSlAN*

-fC6K»o*

source: Ronald G. Ridker, "Future Water Needs and Supplies, With a Note
on Land Use" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

■ I

nology. Even today, most water is used virtually free of cost
or is distributed on a fee basis that provides no incentives for
conservation; and free use of water bodies as waste dumping
grounds is more the rule than the exception. If the cost of
utilizing water for these purposes were raised to more appro-
priate levels, factories and power plants would install tech-
niques of production that save water instead of wasting it;
farmers would modify their irrigation practices or otherwise
adjust by changing location or shifting to crops using less
water; and households would eventually adjust by reducing
lawns and shrubbery.

Sooner or later we will have to deal with water as a scarce
resource. The sooner this is done, the fewer water crises will
emerge in the years ahead. However, doing this will not be
easy technically or politically — most water supplies are run
by local governments. And few will like the austerity created
by the need to conserve on something as fundamental as water.
The rate of national population growth will largely determine
how rapidly we must accomplish these changes.

OUTDOOR RECREATION

On a recent holiday weekend, Yosemite National Park had
a population of 50,000 people, according to a Park source.
Since then, the number of campsites has been reduced and
traffic has been restricted in order to reduce noise and pollu-
tion. Still, visitors are put on notice that the water in the river
is undrinkable. Yellowstone, too, has far more applications
than can be accommodated in the available campsites. Even
so, population densities in the non-wilderness areas of the
Park sometimes exceed densities in the suburbs of Dallas.

More and more Americans have the time, the money, and
the inclination to enjoy the outdoors. Production of truck
campers and camping trailers shot up from 62 thousand in
1961 to over one-half million in 1971. With better roads and
easier travel, national parks have in effect become city parks
for the residents of nearby metropolitan areas. In the past
10 years, visitors to all national park facilities more than
doubled, while the area of the parks increased by only one-
fifth. There are many areas to enjoy and more to be de-
veloped, but the enjoyment will depend largely on how fast
the population grows.

By the year 2000, incomes will nearly double and hours of

leisure will rise. More and more people will be inclined to get
away and will be able to do so. However, our research on
some 24 outdoor recreation activities and the facilities for
these activities indicates that population growing at the 3 -child
rate will exert great pressure on outdoor recreation resources
— so great that, rather than "getting away" to the outdoors,
people will be applying for admission to it.

In the face of rising congestion, many people will substi-
tute organized sports, sightseeing, foreign travel, and artistic
and cultural activities, if they so desire. Rising incomes and
the increase in man-made facilities will make these alterna-
tives possible. For many, these will be adequate alternatives,
but for others they will not.

The prospects for recreation with the 2-child projection are
much different for two reasons. First, the population will not
be as large as that resulting from the 3 -child rate. More im-
portant, the percentage of people in the young ages that make
especially heavy use of outdoor recreation facilities will be
smaller. As a consequence, we estimate that, in the year 2000,
the demand for recreational facilities could be as much as
30 percent less under the 2-child than under the 3 -child rate
of growth.

Either way, recreation will differ from what it is now. The
style of life may change with the lower rate of growth as well,
shifting from more active to more sedentary pursuits. But in
this case it would be voluntary, determined by the individual
needs and preferences of an older population, not imposed
by the desire to avoid overcrowding.

AGRICULTURAL LAND AND FOOD PRICES

At a time when the federal government pays farmers to hold
land out of production, it seems absurd to be looking forward
to a scarcity of good agricultural land and rising food prices.
Yet these are the prospects indicated by our analysis of what
rapid United States population growth implies.

This picture emerges when we combine the requirements for
feeding a rapidly growing population with a sound environ-
mental policy which restricts the use of pesticides and chemical
fertilizers. There are a number of reasons for believing that the
nation will wish to limit application of these chemicals. But to
do so will retard improvements in per acre productivity. This
means that, to produce a given quantity of food, more acres

must be brought into production. It is likely that, with such
restrictions, all the high quality land will have been returned
to production by the year 2000. Consequently, the task of feed-
ing the more rapidly growing population would force us to
bring an additional 50 million acres of relatively low-quality
land into production.

This is an expensive undertaking requiring heavy investment
in equipment, fertilizer, and manpower, for which farmers \
must be compensated. The result is that 50 years from now
the population resulting from the 3 -child average could find
itself having to pay farm food prices some 40 to 50 percent
higher than they would be otherwise. The needs of the popu-
lation at the lower growth rate could be met with practically no
price increase.

The larger population could avoid the price rise by shifting
away from consumption of animal livestock towards vegetables i
and synthetic meats. Perhaps it would shift to a closed system
of agriculture — food from factories. One way or another, a
solution can be found. The problem for a growing population
is to survey the possible solutions and select the ones it dislikes
least.

POLLUTION

As the gross national product goes up, so does the produc-
tion of pollutants. An irony of economic measurement is that
the value of goods and services represented by GNP includes
the cost of producing the pollutants as well as expenditures for
cleaning up afterward. We may fill our tank with gasoline, but
due to engine inefficiency, some portion of that ends up in the
atmosphere as air pollution. Such pollutants are not free — we
had to pay good money to put them in the air. Yet the cost of
putting them there is included in our principal measure of
national economic well-being.

If we clean up the pollutants, the cost of the cleanup effort
is also added to GNP. But many of the costs, such as poorer
health and deteriorated surroundings, are never counted at all.
It is an indictment of our ignorance and indifference toward
what we do to the environment, that in our national economic
accounts we count so few of the "bads," and that even when,
we do count them, we count them as "goods."

To understand the contribution of population to pollution,
we have to distinguish two broad classes of pollutants. The first

|| class includes the major products of combustion — carbon mon-

!; oxide, carbon dioxide, oxides of nitrogen, oxides of sulfur,
i hydrocarbons, and particulates — and several measures of water
I pollution, including biochemical demand for oxygen and sus-
I pended and dissolved solids. The pollutants in this group, once
produced, endure in the environment for a relatively short time
— short enough so that long-term accumulations are not a
problem. This group contains the more massive and commonly
discussed pollutants, and enough information exists about them
so that we can link them to economic activity and population.
The second class of pollutants includes those which endure
longer — radiation and pesticides, plus a wide variety of ever-
changing chemicals emitted by our high technology industries.
Most such chemicals are emitted in small, often highly poison-
ous amounts. For many of these pollutants, future develop-
. ments depend more heavily on changes in technology than on
changes in population and economic growth. In any case, they
are very difficult to link to population and economic growth in
a simple and quantitative fashion. For this reason, the results
we present here are for the first class of pollutants, although
this does not minimize the environmental damage done by the
others.

In the next 30 years, most of these pollutants can be elim-
inated by enforcing treatment standards for pollution emis-
sions. Slower population and economic growth would help;
but over this period, by far the biggest reduction in pollution
can be achieved by a head-on attack. This is illustrated in the
figure showing hydrocarbons (p. 68) — a major component of
auto exhaust and other combustion. In this example, the treat-
ment standard is the Environmental Protection Agency's 1975
standard for emissions into the air. Even if this standard were
not met on schedule, it certainly will be met by the year 2000;
indeed, by that time, we are likely to have much tighter
standards.

The relationships shown in the figure hold generally for the
other pollutants we examined. The reason for the spectacular
results from enforcing standards is that we have imposed so
little control in the past. The results do not assume any big new
technological breakthroughs. It is just that we have only now
begun to fight. Many of the required changes could be imple-
mented today. Soap could be used instead of detergent; natural-
colored paper could replace heavily bleached paper in many
uses; returnable bottles could be used; the horsepower of auto
engines could be reduced. It is not difficult to find answers
when one begins to look.

Whatever we assume about future treatment policy, pollu-

HYDROCARBON EMISSIONS

MILLIONS OF POUNDS PER YEAR

270

254

207

233

196

219

181

B ;:;x;:;

*** **

HI GROWTH GNP

*** **

LO GROWTH GNP

1970

2000

ACTIVE ABATEMENT POLICY

|A | PRESENT TECHNOLOGY

|Bj:ggj IMPROVED TECHNOLOGY

The generation and emission of hydrocarbon pollutants is shown under differ-
ent assumptions about future population growth, economic growth, changes
in technology, and pollution abatement policy.
The bars labeled A, shown for background purposes only, indicate the levels
of hydrocarbon wastes that would be generated under present technology:
These waste levels would be generated if there were no changes in technology
between the 1967-1970 base period and the year 2000.

The bars labeled B show actual emissions of hydrocarbon pollutants in 1970
and expected emissions in the year 2000, assuming no change in pollution
abatement policy. The difference between A and B shows the extent to which
the introduction of more efficient, less wasteful technology between now and
the year 2000 is expected to reduce the generation and emission of pollutants
below the levels generated if technology remained unchanged. Such changes in
technology are likely to come anyway; they do not depend on public pressure
to reduce harmful residuals.

The B bars show that, even with improved technology, pollution levels would
be much higher in the year 2000 than they are now. These levels would, how-
ever, be somewhat lower if population grew at the 2-child rate rather than
the 3-child rate, and if the economy grew at a slower rate rather than a more
rapid rate (lo-growth GNP vs. hi-growth GNP).

The bars labeled C show hydrocarbon emissions in the year 2000 assuming an
active pollution-abatement policy. The assumed policy is the Environmental
Protection Agency's 1975 standard for emissions into the air. The changes in
production and waste treatment processes induced by this policy would have
a greater effect than would any of the other changes shown — in technology,
population growth, or economic growth.

source: Ronald G. Ridker, "The Economy, Resource Requirements, and Pol-
lution Levels" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

tion emissions in the year 2000 would be less with the 2-child
than with the 3-child rate of population growth — from five to
12 percent less, depending on the pollutant. If population
were one percent less than projected in the year 2000, pollution
emissions would be 0.3 to 0.6 percent less. If GNP per capita
were one percent less than projected, emissions would be 0.2
to 0.9 percent less.

Once we achieve control over the emissions from each
source, pollution will once again rise in response to economic
and population growth. We can already see this process at
work in rapidly growing parts of the country. At our Los An-
geles public hearing, meteorologist James D. Edinger described
the successful efforts in Los Angeles to control air pollution
from stationary sources — power plants, heavy industry, home
heating — and the beginnings of the program to control pollu-
tion from motor vehicles. But, he said, in recent years:

... a close race has been run between increasing num-
bers of sources and decreasing emissions per source. But
as emission levels per source are trimmed lower and lower
the effort required to achieve each new increment of im-
provement gets more and more difficult. The increase in
the number of sources, on the other hand, is projected to
rise steadily. If the race for acceptable air quality is to be
won, the heroic emission control programs, present and
anticipated in Los Angeles, must soon be joined by a
leveling off, if not a reduction, in the number of sources.1

Our own research on air pollution indicates that such worries
are well founded. The standard for concentrations of nitrogen
oxides used by the Environmental Protection Agency is 100
micrograms per cubic meter. In 1970, the air in 36 urban areas
had concentrations above this level. An active abatement policy
would eliminate the problem in most areas. But if our projec-
tions of economic and population growth come anywhere close
to the truth, Los Angeles and San Diego in the year 2000 will
still have a problem. In Los Angeles, we estimate that even
with an active abatement policy, concentrations of nitrogen
oxides will still be at least 50 percent above standard, and
probably well above that. In this region of the country, clearly
something must give : the rate of population growth, the use of
the internal combustion engine — especially for personal trans-
port— or the standard itself.

As the case of air quality in Los Angeles illustrates, problems
of environmental quality are often worse in metropolitan areas
that are larger and in regions that are more densely populated.

This is clearly true for air pollution (and associated respiratory
disease), noise, traffic congestion, and time spent getting to
work. Other factors are less clear. Our research shows that
sewage and water treatment costs per person decline as city size
increases to about 100,000; above that, engineering data sug-
gest that costs should be the same for conventional facilities,
but the actual observed costs appear to rise. If large cities have
to change their sewage facilities, costs per person will be much
higher. Similarly, solid waste disposal costs either follow a
U-shaped curve or increase with city size and density. There is
also evidence that large cities change local climate — wind,
cloudiness, temperature, and precipitation; we really do not
know whether or not such changes are bad. The inner city has
all these environmental problems but to a heightened degree.

Yet the underlying cause of poor environmental quality in
the larger urban centers may often not be size. Most of our
largest centers are the old cities of the north; their problems
may arise more from urban forms and transportation systems
appropriate to an earlier era, old and uncoordinated facilities,
multiple governmental jurisdictions, and the injustices that lead
to inadequate financing and high proportions of minority
groups and poor in central cities. In new cities as well as old,
environmental quality suffers from inadequate pricing of pub-
lic facilities and common property resources like space and
waste disposal media, such as rivers and air. The historical evi-
dence relating environmental quality to metropolitan size may
not be applicable to the building of new cities and the refitting
of older cities; indeed, many such problems would remain
wherever people live.

The total volume of pollutants in the United States reponds,
as we have seen, to the size of the national economy, which in
turn depends heavily on the size of the national population.
People consume resources wherever they live. Whether in New
York City or a small town in the midwest, people still drive an
automobile made of steel using coal mined in West Virginia.
In the process, the air in cities is fouled by smoke and the
scenery and the streams of West Virginia are spoiled by strip
mining. Wherever Americans live, they make huge demands
on the nation's and the world's resources and environment.

RISKS AND CHOICES

As a nation, we have always faced choices and always will.
What matters is the range of choice we have and the urgency

with which the need to choose is thrust upon us The evidence
indicates that continued population growth narrows our
choices and forces us to choose in haste.

From the standpoint of resources and the environment, the
United States can cope with rapid population growth for the
next 30 to 50 years. But doing so will become an increasingly
unpleasant and risky business — unpleasant because "coping'
with growth means adopting solutions we don't like; risky be-
cause it means adopting solutions before we understand them,
Within the United States, the risks are ecological and social.
And, there are risks which involve our relationship with the
rest of the world.

We in this country are tampering with the ecosystem in
many ways, the consequences of which we do not begin to
understand. The crude methods used to estimate the effect of
emissions on air quality and the damages and costs of urban
pollution illustrate our ignorance all too well. Worse yet is our
understanding of the second class of pollutants, bypassed in
our analysis precisely because we know so little about them.
Because such pollutants endure longer, because they are highly
poisonous in small doses, because new pollutants are contin-
ually being introduced, and because there are long time lags
between emissions and the appearance of damages, we shall
not quickly improve our knowledge in this area.

Radioactive wastes are an example. There will be more
nuclear power plants if rapid population and economic growth
occurs, but nuclear management and technology are changing
so fast that there is no stable benchmark from which to esti-
mate the amount of radioactive wastes likely to escape into the
environment. We know that, once in the environment, such
wastes can travel long distances through space and food chains,
and we know the kinds of damage they can cause. But we do
not know where they will come to rest, the extent of the dam-
age, or when it will occur. Clearly, we need to know far more
about how natural systems function when forced to absorb
greater quantities of pollutants.

Beyond pollution, there are profound ecological impacts.2
the simplification and destabilization of ecosystems associated
with modern one-crop agriculture; the reduction in the variety
of gene pools in our most important plants; the threat to the
productivity of the sea through the filling-in of salt marshes;
the unknown consequences of climate changes caused by man's
activities; and many more.

Population growth is clearly not the sole culprit in ecological
damage. To believe that it is, is to confuse how things are done
with how many people are doing them. Much of the damage

we do results from efforts to satisfy fairly trivial preferences — ■
for unblemished fruit, detergents, rapidly accelerating cars, and
bright colored paper products. We can and should cut back on
frivolous and extravagant consumption that pollutes. The way
things are done can, to a significant degree, be changed regard-
less of how many people are doing them. But the overall effect
is a product of numbers times styles of life taken together
One multiplies the other to produce the total impact.

The real risk lies in the fact that increasing numbers press
us to adopt new technologies before we know what we are
doing. The more of us there are the greater is the temptation
to introduce solutions before their side effects are known. It
might be far better environmentally to postpone the introduc-
tion of nuclear power plants until the inherently cleaner fusion
reactors are developed. When one pesticide or food additive is
found to be dangerous to man, it is replaced with another about
which we know less. We undertake the expenditure of billions
on water treatment, without knowing whether the benefits out-
weigh the costs of other opportunities foregone. Slower popu-
lation growth will not eliminate this situation, but it will reduce
the urgency, the "crash program" character of much that we
do. It will buy time for the development of sensible solutions.

We can cope with population growth for another half cen-
tury if we have to; the question is whether we want to. We can
cope with resource shortages — if we cannot mine a resource,
we can import, design around it, find a substitute, or reduce
consumption. Where water deficits threaten, we can choose
between charging more for its use, transferring people and
industry to other parts of the country, and constructing longer
and larger canals. If pollution emissions cannot be tolerated,
we can change production processes, improve treatment, sepa-
rate polluters from their victims, treat the symptoms, or simply
produce less of the commodity causing the pollution. Conges-
tion during commuter hours can be handled by restricting the
use of private cars, developing mass transit, and staggering
work hours. Congestion at recreation sites can be handled by
building additional facilities, improving management, encour-
aging substitutes such as foreign travel, and if necessary, by
staggering vacations. Even land shortages for agriculture can
be handled, given sufficient lead time, through farming the sea,
changing our diet, developing synthetic foods, and so forth.

Such changes pose physical, technical, and managerial chal-
lenges that we can probably meet if we must. But in so doing,
we shall pay a cost reckoned not in dollars but in our way
of life

Population growth forces upon us slow but irreversible

changes in life style. Imbedded in our traditions as to what
constitutes the American way of life is freedom from public
regulation — virtually free use of water; access to uncongested.
unregulated roadways; freedom to do as we please with what
we own; freedom from permits, licenses, fees, red tape, and
bureaucrats; and freedom to fish, swim, and camp where and
when we will. Clearly, we do not live this way now. Maybe
we never did. But everything is relative. The population of
2020 may look back with envy on what, from their vantage
point, appears to be our relatively unfettered way of life.

Conservation of water resources, restrictions on pollution
emissions, limitations on fertilizer and pesticides, preservation
of wilderness areas, and protection of animal life threatened
by man — all require public regulation. Rules must be set and
enforced, complaints heard and adjudicated. Granted, the
more we can find means of relying on the price system, the
easier will be the bureaucratic task. Indeed, we ought to be
experimenting right now with ways of making price incen-
tives induce appropriate use of the environment and resources
At present, most monetary incentives work the wrong way,
inducing waste and pollution rather than the opposite.

But even if effluent charges and user fees became universal,
they will have to be set administratively; emissions and use
will have to be metered, and fees collected. It appears inevi-
table that a larger portion of our lives will be devoted to filling
out forms, arguing with the computer or its representatives,
appealing decisions, waiting for our case to be handled, find-
ing ways to evade or to move ahead in line. In many small
ways, everyday life will become more contrived.

Many such changes will have to occur no matter which
population projection occurs. But the difference, small at first,
would grow with time until, a half century from now, the
two societies may appear qualitatively different.

Another price we pay for having to cope with continued
population growth is the pressure to keep on postponing the
solution of social problems. While growth continues, top
priority will be given to finding the necessary resources, con-
trolling pollutants, correcting the damages they have done,
and building ever larger water canals, highways, and mass
transit systems. A large and perhaps growing fraction of our
physical and intellectual capital is directly or indirectly de-
voted to these tasks — to finding ways to cope with the prob-
lems that continued growth generates. From past experience,
we can predict with a fair degree of confidence that such
priorities will continue to subordinate efforts devoted to resolv-
ing fundamental social problems When something must give

because the system is becoming overloaded, it is unlikely to
be the building of another dam.

The point is that continued population growth limits our
options. In the case of the larger population, with less land
per person and more people to accommodate, there are fewer
alternatives, less room for diversity, less room for error. To
cope with continued growth, technology must advance, life-
styles must change. Slower population growth offers us the
difference between choice and necessity, between prudence
and living dangerously.

THE UNITED STATES AND THE WORLD

The research done for the Commission showed that the
United States will greatly enlarge its demands on world re-
sources, especially minerals and petroleum, over the decades
ahead. We will be requiring substantially larger imports of
many minerals, such as chromium, vanadium, cobalt, and
nickel, for which domestic supplies are not available or are
available only at substantially higher costs.

The demand of other countries for minerals, petroleum,
and other resources will certainly also rise sharply over the
coming decades. This will result from rapid increases in out-
put per person in other industrialized countries and from the
rapid modernization of agriculture and industry in develop-
ing countries. The rates of increase in production in other
parts of the world are likely to be higher than those of the
United States. Their rates of increase in demand for mineral
supplies are likely to rise even more sharply, because they are
at an earlier stage of the industrialization process and because
the composition of their GNP includes proportionately more
goods and fewer services than does that of the United States.

Taking into account the huge increases in population which
are in prospect, it seems clear that demands for natural re-
sources in other parts of the world will rise more rapidly than
demands in the United States; thus, the share of the United
States in the use of world resources will steadily decline. For
example, projections made for the Commission indicate that
over the next 50 years the share of the United States in the
world's use of aluminum may decline from 37 percent in
1968 to as low as nine percent by the year 2020. In the same
time period, the share of the United States of total world cop-

per requirements may drop from 22 percent to five percent

While all such figures necessarily reflect uncertain assump-
tions about production, income, and technology, nevertheless
they indicate the extremely important extent to which the
United States is inextricably involved in the development and
use of resources on a worldwide scale.

Our research also demonstrates that environmental issues
will have to be faced increasingly on an international basis
over the years ahead. There are already conspicuous cases
of environmental damage and risk which cannot be solved on
a national basis. The continuing problem of petroleum pollu-
tion in the oceans is such a case. Neither the oceans nor the
atmosphere can be successfully dealt with if one looks only
at the territory within a nation's boundary. And many addi-
tional issues of international ecological significance will be
increasingly important — such as the effects of enormous in-
creases in world use of pesticides and chemical fertilizers, the
environmental impact of multi-national corporations, and
many more.

The Commission has been deeply impressed by the unprece-
dented size and significance of the looming problems of re-
sources and environment on a world scale. We see the need
for much greater efforts than are underway now to analyze
and understand these problems, and to develop international
policies and programs to deal with them. We foresee poten-
tially grave issues of clashing interests among nations and
world regions, which could have very serious effects on the
United States.

Therefore, we believe strongly that, in its own interest, the
United States should work positively and constructively with
other countries and international organizations in analyzing
and solving problems related to natural resources and the
environment in the world. We have made no special study
of the detailed policies and programs which the United States
should pursue for these purposes. We do now emphatically
urge, however, that the nation join vigorously and coopera-
tively in solving problems of international trade, assistance to
less-developed countries, and other pressing issues which will
affect so sharply not only the future well-being of others in
the world but the direct prospects for a sensible and respect-
able future for ourselves. We should not approach such prob-
lems in a spirit of charity or largesse. Our own future depends
heavily on the evolution of a sensible international economic
order, capable of dealing with natural resources and environ-
mental conditions on a world scale.

LONG-TERM STRATEGIC PLANNING

Our consideration of the problems and prospects involved
in this country's long-term future convinces us that an im-
portant dimension of policy formation is being overlooked.
This dimension involves the identification, study, and initiation
of actions with respect to future problems that may require
lead times of decades rather than years to resolve. There is
a need for continuous monitoring and evaluation of the long-
term implications of demographic changes, of future resource
demands and supplies, of possible pollution overload situa-
tions, and of the underlying trends in technology and patterns
of social behavior that influence these factors.

Once future problems are identified, there is a need to
undertake the necessary research and development and to
formulate the policies to resolve them. We need to study our
social, political, and economic institutions with a view towards
recommending modifications that will reduce the discrepancy
between the private and the public interest. Practical pro-
cedures for utilizing the effluent charge approach to environ-
mental quality management and for initiating a rational sys-
tem of land-use planning are important cases in point. We
need to develop technologies that conserve particularly scarce
physical and environmental resources. While appropriate efflu-
ent charges will encourage private business to move in this
direction, government sponsorship of "yardstick" research on
industrial technologies is necessary, particularly when our
concern is with the problems farther in the future than private
business can afford to look.

While parts of these tasks are being performed by isolated
agencies, coordination and analytical assessment on a broad
level are lacking. Private business firms and most government
agencies are of necessity too present-oriented or mission-
oriented to serve these functions adequately; nor can they
be left to ad hoc commissions such as this one. On the other
hand, we do feel that some group should be assigned central
responsibility for such functions. Such a body would serve
as a "lobby for the future" to identify potential population,
resource, and environmental problems well in advance of their
occurrence; to establish priorities and sponsor technical and
social research directed towards their resolution; and where
necessary to formulate and recommend policies to that end.

CHAPTER 6. GOVERNMENT

Can government adapt to the new realities and fragility of
our existence as the pace of our lives accelerates, the world
grows more crowded, technology multiplies life's complexi-
ties, and the environment is increasingly threatened?* Whether
the economy thrives and environmental crises are avoided
depend very much on government playing an active role — pre-
paring for population change in advance of crises, and estab-
lishing and implementing appropriate policies. In fact, most
of the recommendations we shall present imply government
action.

We have examined the effect of different rates of popula-
tion growth on the demand for key governmental services
in the years ahead. The results of this research are presented
below.

Beyond the question of costs, any concern with the effects
of population on government requires us to raise broad ques-
tions of the relations between government and the size, char-
acteristics, and distribution of the population it serves. These
questions range from the essential characteristics of demo-
cratic government — citizen participation and representation,
justice, and national security — to the adequacy and efficiency
of ordinary, taken-for-granted service functions of govern-
ment at all levels.

Government represents not only a universally and vitally
important segment of our national life that is affected by
population change; it also constitutes the channel through

*A separate statement by Commissioner James S. Rummonds appears
on pages 308-310.

which a national concern with population must act to affect
the causes and cope with the consequences of population
growth and change. Can local, state, and federal governments
cope adequately with the problems associated with popula-
tion change through their traditional structure, means of
financing, and allocation of responsibilities and jurisdictions?
The fundamental questions we have raised transcend politi-
cal party distinctions; they are concerned directly with peo-
ple, how they live, and how they are governed.

Our examination of these questions gives us no cause for
complacency or satisfaction. We are troubled by our assess-
ment of the readiness and capability of government to deal
with problems associated with population growth and change,
as well as by the impacts of growth and change on our basic
governmental institutions. The choices that face us are not
easy ones, nor do we view population stabilization as any
final solution to the problems raised.

PUBLIC SERVICE COSTS1

Regardless of how our population grows in the coming
decades, we are going to spend more on public services, sim-
ply because of rising demands for new types of services and
improved quality of existing services. Even if population were
to remain at its current level, we would have to spend more
just to satisfy present demands for better housing, education,
transportation, health services, environmental improvements,
and the elimination of hunger and poverty. Conversely, even
if no new services or improvements in quality were demanded,
costs would rise because, even at the slow growth rate, we
will have a larger population requiring public services.

Different population growth rates will lead to different levels
of demand for government services. The Commission has
examined in detail three sectors in which government activities
play a significant role — education, health, and welfare. Our
studies were based on a comparison of the differences in ex-
penditures required by different levels of demand resulting
from population growth under the 2- and 3-child averages
between now and the year 2000.

Our projections of government expenditures for education
in the year 2000 assume that a larger percentage of people
will be enrolled, and allow for improvements in the quality
of education. These quality improvements include more

variety in teaching methods and greater use of paraprofes-
sionals, technical equipment, and materials. In 1970, about
7.5 percent of GNP — some $74 billion — was spent on educa-
tion. Our projections suggest that, in the year 2000, the
faster-growing population would spend 13 percent of its
GNP, or $400 billion, on education, compared to an expen-
diture level of 9.7 percent of GNP, or $276 billion, with
slower population growth.

Another way of expressing the impact of the 2- versus the
3-child projections is in terms of the tradeoffs between the
quality of education and the number of people to be edu-
cated. Assume that we will spend 10 percent of our GNP on
education in the year 2000. What type of education would
this buy under the two population projections? With the larger
population, this expenditure would provide seven percent of
the students with our assumed higher quality education, and
93 percent would receive education comparable to quality to-
day. With the same proportion of the GNP spent on educa-
tion under the 2-child projection, all students could receive a
higher quality education.

While the effect of population on educational services is
large, this is not the case for expenditures in the health and
welfare fields. In the health field, we looked at the demand
for physician visits, dental visits, and hospital beds. We found
that, for a given quality of health care, the more rapidly grow-
ing population would spend $20 billion more over the next
three decades than would the slower growing population. This
averages out to a difference in annual expenditure of less
than $1 billion.

We examined the demand for welfare services using both
today's definition of poverty and a definition that would in-
crease at the same rate as per capital income. The evidence
suggests that annual welfare expenditures, using either defini-
tion of poverty, would probably be slightly smaller under the
2-child population projection than under the 3-child projec-
tion; the difference would be no more than $2 billion and
probably less. Relative to GNP in the year 2000, this amount
would be insignificant.

Despite higher average incomes, a slower rate of popula-
tion growth will not eliminate poverty. As we have pointed
out, if poverty is to be eliminated by the year 2000, economic
growth must be accompanied by policies that redistribute in-
come.

There are additional sectors of the economy, such as hous-
ing, transportation, and energy production, in which govern-
ment is involved heavily. While the Commission studied in

detail only the government involvement in education, health,
and welfare, a general conclusion that can be drawn is that
the country will have to spend more in absolute terms to pro-
vide public services for a population growing at the 3-child
rate than at the 2-child rate. Also, slower growth would pro-
duce a higher income per capita. Under our present tax sys-
tems, this would mean that per capita goverment revenues
would be greater.

However, these benefits of slower growth will not auto-
matically guarantee a higher quality of life. This will be
achieved only if we deliberately choose to take advantage of
the opportunities that slower growth presents. The wise use
of these opportunities depends on public and private decisions
yet to be made.

STATE AND LOCAL RESOURCES
AND REQUIREMENTS

As we have seen, with slower national population growth,
the provision of public services would be less of a burden
on the nation. What would that mean for the state and local
levels of government? The day-to-day services of state and
local governments — in such fields as education, welfare,
health services, police and fire protection, highways, trans-
portation facilities, sanitation, and waste disposal — are in-
timately tied to the number of persons they serve and to the
demographic characteristics of that population. Changes in
population can have a substantial impact on requirements
for public services as well as on the availability of resources
to meet them.

Even if national population stabilized, there would still be
changes in population size and composition in states and lo-
calities as a result of variations in natural increase and migra-
tion within the United States and from abroad.

Because the more affluent states attract migrants, char-
acteristically in the economically productive age groups, the
strains on state government from growth through migration
can be accommodated relatively easily. Natural increase, how-
ever, creates demands for services without providing the
necessary economic resources for meeting them. In addition,
some of the highest rates of natural increase are found in the
poorest states. Thus, differences in the way in which state
populations grow — whether primarily by migration or pri-

marily by natural increase — may be as important as growth
itself in affecting a state's ability to meet increased demands
for public services. Federal policies which would have the
effect of lowering the birthrate and national programs which
would assume a larger share of financial support for public
welfare, education, and health could help reduce some of the
inequities among states.2

Among local jurisdictions, population change shows even
wider variety than among states. Some rural communities,
exhibiting a high rate of natural increase and a net popula-
tion loss because of high outmigration, have heavy public
burdens due to relatively large numbers of children and the
elderly to serve. While metropolitan suburbs draw generally
more affluent residents, the central cities attract poor rural
migrants and recent foreign arrivals.3 The unequal effect on
demand for local government services is illustrated in Louis-
ville, Kentucky, where the central city encompasses less than
half the population of the metropolitan area, but has more
than 90 percent of the area's public assistance recipients.

While local governments adjust their expenditure and em-
ployment levels to population changes, it is not easy. They
struggle to eliminate the time lags between population change
and the recognition of that change by appropriate agencies,
the perception of its meaning for service demands, and the
provision of services. We have also found that public demand
for improvement in the scope, intensity, and quality of govern-
ment services has caused sharp nation-wide expansions in the
level of activity of local government, at a rate far exceeding
the growth in national population.4

These matters are cause for concern, and we are by no
means satisfied that the attempts of local government to ad-
just service levels to population changes and respond to pub-
lic demand are adequate to meet the needs of the future.
The findings of the Commission's national public opinion sur-
vey add to this concern. Only 10 percent of the general pub-
lic rated the performance of local government "excellent,"
43 percent thought its performance "good," 31 percent "fair,"
and 12 percent "poor." Nor are we satisfied that present serv-
ices and the taxes supporting them are sufficient and equitably
distributed.5

There are sharp disparities among communities' resources
and revenue-raising efforts. These stem largely from the com-
bination of an excessive reliance on the property tax and a
fragmented structure of governments in metropolitan areas.
The restriction of local government jurisdictions to political
boundaries that cut across settlement patterns leaves many

local units with more than their fair share of service de-
mands and others with a free ticket to avoid some of local
governments' most difficult tasks.6

The imbalance between resources and demands for serv-
ices is especially acute in the contrast between suburban com-
munities and the central cities of our large metropolitan areas.
Because of the lower incomes of central city residents, their
lower tax capacity, and greater demand for higher cost serv-
ices, a greater tax effort is required of central city residents
who, at the same time, often receive a poorer quality of
service than their more affluent suburban neighbors. Older,
built-up suburbs close to the central city and receiving its
overflow of high cost residents are also at a disadvantage
with a very limited tax capacity.

We are not satisfied that levels of basic public services
should be dependent on the resources yielded by the local
property tax — high in rich communities, low in needy com-
munities— and feel that greater flexibility and imagination are
needed to find other revenue sources.

In addition to the mismatch between resources and need,
the ability of local governments to continue to cope is clearly
threatened. Taxpayer revolts, the drive for federal revenue
sharing, the fiscal anguish of cities — all testify to the pre-
cariousness of the process of providing public services at a
satisfactory level of quantity and quality.

It is not enough to consider only whether local govern-
ments can adjust service levels to future population changes.
Ways must be found for local governments to narrow the
gap between their needs and their resources and for the
tax burden to rest more heavily on those best able to pay.
A geographical broadening of the local tax base, at least with-
in metropolitan areas, could both encompass the effects of
population change and help narrow the fiscal disparities, if
revenues were raised on the basis of fiscal capacity and dis-
tributed on the basis of expenditure needs. The responsibility
of state and federal governments to help bear part of the
burden needs to be expanded.

DEMOCRATIC REPRESENTATION
AND PARTICIPATION7

Our political institutions were designed originally to gov-
ern a much smaller society, organized and oriented differently

from what we have today. These institutions have changed
as the society has changed. They have demonstrated remark-
able flexibility and adaptability, but they also have shown
some serious inadequacies. Are they capable of accommodat-
ing still more population growth in the future?

The answer to this question depends in part on maintaining
and improving citizen participation and representation. Polit-
ical activity and interest among urban people is as high as, if
not higher than, that of rural people, according to the Commis-
sion's public opinion survey and other evidence. Still, the devel-
opment of metropolitan political forms to deal with population
change must include efforts to increase citizen representation
and participation and the responsiveness of a larger bu-
reaucracy.

Representation at the national level is diluted by population
growth. The constituency of an individual congressman has
grown enormously since the size of the House of Representa-
tives was fixed at 435 members in 1910. Then, each congress-
man represented 211,000 citizens, on the average. In 1970, a
congressional constituency averaged 470,000 citizens. By the
year 2000, each congressman in a 435-seat House will represent
623,000 persons under the 2-child growth rate, or 741,000
persons in the 3-child case.

The size of the constituency is clearly not the sole factor in
determining excellence in government. Perhaps it may not even
be very important, compared with the quality of the represen-
tatives, the size and professionalism of their staffs, the size of
the governing body itself, and other factors. But, it cannot be
denied that the individual constituent's voice will be diminished
under such circumstances. And, no increase of Congress's
ability to communicate with constituents by mass media can
disguise or make up for that diminution.

Population growth at the national level is just one demo-
graphic element to be considered in the adaptation of our
political system to the needs of the 21st century. Population
redistribution, as well as population growth, will affect the
congressional profile. Representation will follow the people to
metropolitan areas, away from the rural areas — to growing
states like California and other coastal regions, away from the
midcontinent. For example, if California continues to grow as
it has in the past, its share of the seats in the House of Repre-
sentatives would increase from 10 percent of the total to 14
percent by the year 2000. Thus, California would have over
one-fifth of the 270 electoral votes required to elect the
President.

While the strains on the political system related to large

constituencies may be alleviated somewhat by population stabi-
lization, increased metropolitan concentration and interre-
gional migration will continue to alter the makeup of the
Congress and shift its orientation. The Commission is con-
cerned about the uncertainties implied by these findings and
believes they deserve further attention.

ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE8

The administration of justice stands as a fundamental role
of government in our society. The fact that this system today
is under pressure is too obvious to require demonstration. Con-
gested court dockets, long waiting periods before trial in crim-
inal and civil cases, the torment of the correctional system —
all bear evidence to the troubles. No matter what the circum-
stances may be in the year 2000, the gravity of the current
situation requires an immediate and aggressive effort to im-
prove the present system of justice.

The Supreme Court of the United States is the final arbiter
at the apex of the judicial system. In the nature of things, we
can have only one of these. In 1824, when our population was
11 million, Daniel Webster could argue an important case
before the Supreme Court for several days. Today, oral argu-
ments are usually limited to one hour or less, and the Court
hears only a very small percentage of the several thousand
cases that arise through the expanded lower court system and
the increasingly popular appeals procedures. The same type of
pressure extends to the single supreme court in many states.

Population growth is one of many contributing factors to the
pressures on our system of justice. The evolution of metro-
politan communities and the accompanying modern life styles
are also related. In urban areas, there is an increase in litigation
and other legal actions, perhaps due to increasing numbers of
impersonal contacts and frustrations. However, court conges-
tion and legal delays reflect not only population change, but
also, and perhaps more importantly, broadened concepts of the
kinds of injustices amenable to adjudication and extension of
the concepts of due process.

Improvement of our present system for administering justice
must have a high priority on the nation's agenda. Population
stabilization cannot accomplish that improvement. It can, as
an alternative to continued population growth, reduce one of
the pressures on the performance of this critical government
function.

NATIONAL SECURITY

In considering the impact of population growth on the
capacity of the United States to provide for its national secu-
rity, the Commission consulted numerous experts within the
military establishment and the academic community. They all
believed that population stabilization would pose no threat to
the country's security.

When the nation was young and her independence not very
secure, her defense depended upon the number of people bear-
ing arms. Then, experience clearly showed the wisdom of a
larger population. More people meant greater military strength
and greater national security. Today, our national security
is increasingly dependent upon the skillful and intelligent
practice of international relations, and our military strength
is less dependent upon men and rifles. Recent technology,
including nuclear weaponry, has reduced the significance
of massive armies. Minor military conflicts in the future
are likely to be small, localized, and dependent on conventional
weapons and limited manpower. If there are any major wars in
the future, the probability is that they would involve nuclear
weapons long before troop activity on the scale of World War
II was reached.

Because of the expected nature of future military conflicts,
experts suggest that a peacetime active duty force of two to
three million would be sufficient to ensure national security.9
The three million people required by the military would be less
than six percent of the male population 18 to 45 years old, even
if the country's population growth followed the 2-child projec-
tion between now and the year 2000. An even smaller percent-
age of the population would be required if we had a volunteer
army, because there would presumably be less turnover, greater
skills, and more efficiency. For comparison, we should note
that, since 1955, the Armed Services' demand for the nation's
manpower resources has averaged nine to 10 percent of the
male population 18 to 45 years old. Clearly, the future popula-
tion would be more than adequate to supply the military with
manpower. Thus, we can discern no threat to the nation's
security from lesser future growth of total population.

If there is a change in population that would be important
to national security, it would relate to the health, education,
and productivity, not to the size of the population. The increas-

ingly complex technology of war, and the growing reliance of
the military on machines rather than on men, mean that mili-
tary manpower must be better educated and skilled than in the
past. Beyond this, we must consider what proportion of people
are active in the social, political, and economic life of the
nation. At present, this portion of the population in the United
States does not include all adults — in particular, those who are
poor, discriminated against, unemployed, unproductive, and
counterproductive. The conversion of this fraction into a part
of the fully active population would be significant for national
security.10

THE EFFECTS OF GOVERNMENT PROGRAMS
ON POPULATION DISTRIBUTION11

Policies and programs designed to influence the migration
and distribution of the population are not unknown in this
country. The Ordinance of 1785, which opened up the Ohio
territories, and the Homestead Law of 1862 were part of a
national policy to settle the western frontier. The Resettlement
Administration during the Depression was an attempt to slow
migration trends from farm areas.

At present, the United States has no explicit overall popula-
tion distribution policy, nor does it have any programs whose
primary intent is to influence major migration trends. However,
many public programs, such as economic development of rural
and depressed areas, urban renewal of central cities, and open
space acquisition, have the modification of settlement trends as
a secondary intent. Such programs have had relatively greater
impact within metropolitan areas than between regions. Their
indifferent success in affecting broad geographic distribution
has been attributed to the fact that they were neither designed,
administered, nor funded to counteract effectively the strong
economic forces of the private sector which induce population
trends.

There is a virtually endless list of programs which have un-
intended consequences for the territorial arrangement of the
population. The federal highway program, national parks sys-
tem, minimum wage laws, import quota system, housing pro-
grams, and many others, all have distributional effects which
are diverse and often conflicting.

Programs that have a particularly clear impact, stimulating
the growth of many areas by attracting migration, are the

Defense Department's procurement and research and develop-
ment programs, which account for about 10 percent of total
federal expenditures. The rapid growth of Texas and southern
California reveals the significance of such programs. Other
programs give rise to outmigration. For example, recent agri-
cultural policies providing incentives to restrict acreage and
increase productivity, may have been partly responsible for
heavy migration off the farm.

Perhaps unintended demographic consequences are unavoid-
able if policy goals other than population distribution have
priority. Nevertheless, unintended consequences should at least
be anticipated. Although the territorial impact of some govern-
ment programs is known, there is much to be learned. If the
demographic side effects of policies were better understood,
then the desirability of their consquences could be evaluated in
the policy-making process and plans made to alleviate unde-
sirable aspects.

This society has yet to adopt policies to plan for and influ-
ence the distribution of a significant proportion of the popula-
tion according to any scheme that departs substantially from
current trends. Although a majority of the public thinks the
government should do something about national distribution
patterns, there is little active public interest in or support for
the formation of a national distribution policy. And, it may
be difficult to persuade elected officials in districts or states that
would lose population relative to other areas, that the national
interest demands a planned reduction in the population of their
constituency — and a consequent reduction in the number of
representatives, political influence, and federal funds tied to
population size criteria.

FRAGMENTATION OF METROPOLITAN
GOVERNMENT12

One of the major difficulties in guiding and accommodating
population growth is the fragmentation of government in met-
ropolitan areas. Population movements are often unaffected by
political boundaries and population-related problems extend
across jurisdictions.

Local general-purpose governments — counties and munici-
palities— were created originally to serve all the people living
in their territory. Special governments, such as sanitation dis-
tricts, conservation districts, and port and transit authorities,

were developed to perform limited specific services for special
constituencies. As metropolitan growth fills in the countryside
adjoining larger cities, not only do these local governments find
themselves elbow to elbow, but they also become overlaid with
a patchwork quilt of special governments with independent
policy-making and revenue-raising powers. Missing is the effec-
tive force seeking comprehensive solutions to comprehensive
problems from a metropolitan-wide perspective. This territorial
and functional fragmentation of governmental responsibility
could become an even more serious problem in the year 2000.
In 1967, there were about 16,000 nonschool local govern-
ments in metropolitan areas. If recent trends continue, by the
year 2000 there are likely to be over 32,000 such govern-
mental units in metropolitan areas. The proliferation of spe-
cialized districts will account for half the increase. As metro-
politan problems such as air pollution, inadequate housing,
crime, and insufficient sewage treatment facilities spread
across more and more political boundaries, it becomes in-
creasingly urgent that cooperative metropolitan efforts replace
jurisdictional jealousies and narrowly defined self-interests.
Although this need for cooperation is gradually becoming rec-
ognized, the federal government should increase its efforts
to help bring about public understanding of the issue and
assist local governments in making the necessary adjustments.

GOVERNMENT PLANNING13

The success of government in guiding and accommodating
future population change hinges on its ability to plan effec-
tively and comprehensively. This means planning for land use,
environmental quality, and the necessary public services. For
example, a plan for a sewer line which will encourage resi-
dential construction should also be accompanied by plans for
adequate sewage treatment, financing a new school, recrea-
tional and other community facilities. These plans should be
coordinated with development in the neighboring commit
nities.

The federal government has encouraged the development of
a technical planning capacity at the local level, but the struc-
ture of local government often militates against its effective
use. The fragmentation of metropolitan areas into many
municipalities, each with power to zone its own land, and each
relying on its property tax base for general revenues, effeo

tively prevents the organization or coordination of local zon-
ing changes to implement a strategy for population distribu-
tion or development on a metropolitan-wide basis.

Lawrence Christmas, Assistant Director of the Northern
Illinois Planning Commission, told us that,

The primary forces now shaping the [metropolitan] popu-
lation distribution pattern are comprised of individual
decisions by hundreds of suburban governmental units,
individual decisions by private developers, and individ-
ual decisions by a few large, single-purpose regional and
state agencies in Washington.14

Tom Bradley, a councilman in Los Angeles, testified that,
**. . . cities have failed miserably to plan for orderly growth
. . . the cities failed because into the planning vacuum which
they left by their inaction, stepped the land developer, FHA,
and the highway engineer."15

Although the analytical techniques and creative capacities
for planning are available in many metropolitan areas today,
the absence of adequate mechanisms for coordinating the
planning efforts of individual political units means that the
resources are rarely used. When they are used, it is to deal
with short-term problems imposed by current pressures of
population growth.

CONCLUSION

In this chapter, we have argued that slowing down the rate
of population growth would ease the problems facing govern-
ment in the years ahead: Potential demands for many gov-
ernmental services would be smaller with lower population
growth rates; and potential resources to finance governmental
activities would be larger as a corollary of higher per capita
income.

However, it would be a serious error to read these conclu-
sions as comforting and reassuring. Under the most optimistic
assumptions, at least 50 million more people will be added
to our population before the end of the century. This growth
will add to the demands on governmental services and to the
complexity of achieving a participatory political process re-
sponsive to contemporary conditions.

More important, these added demands and complexities

...

will fall on governmental structures and processes already
heavily burdened — many of us would say overburdened — by
the problems facing the nation. In a time of headlong tech-
nological change, economic growth, and continuously rising
population, the ability of Americans to deal with environ-
mental pollution, public safety, economic opportunity, racial
and ethnic discrimination, and many other urgent issues, is
far from assured. Different members of this Commission
would assess the present inadequacies of federal, state, and
local government in the United States with varying degrees
of alarm, but we all agree that fundamental improvements
are urgently needed in the effectiveness, speed, and equity
with which our various governments deal with vital issues.
These issues must be addressed directly, regardless of popu-
lation change.

Rather than finding reassurance, therefore, in the prospects
that lower population growth will ease future governmental
problems, we emphasize our concern because even more bur-
dens are going to be added to governments now functioning
inadequately.

Two aspects of the matter are of special concern. The first
is that the great bulk of the people who will be added to our
population over the next few decades will live in metropolitan
areas. Coupled with continuing migration from rural to urban
areas, this means that the weight of population growth will
fall unevenly on governmental units. This will require the
greatest response from federal, state, and local governments
in dealing with metropolitan problems.

But it is precisely in this field — establishing effective and
democratic governmental systems in metropolitan areas —
that our existing governments have been most deficient
Archaic governmental boundaries, incongruity between the
location of many problems and the location of the financial
resources to deal with them, and inequities in the distribu-
tion of public services, tax burdens, and the judicial system
have been cited as problems. Also the need to accommodate
both civil service protection and responsiveness to neighbor-
hood and community demands and an ability to make and
execute plans on a metropolitan scale — all these and many
other difficulties of metropolitan government are with us now
and will be exacerbated by the population growth to come*

The second aspect of government problems of special con-
cern to this Commission is the substantial number of persons
in our country who feel that government is not responsive
to what they see as the real needs of modern society. Time
and again in our public hearings, we were told that groups

which feel deprived and discriminated against by current
government policies will be skeptical and resistant to new
governmental programs such as those needed in the popula-
tion field. These groups, which feel they are not allowed to
participate fairly in governmental processes, will be hard to
persuade that the government speaks for them in proposing
policies concerning population matters.

These views — which are felt strongly by ethnic and racial
minorities but are by no means limited to those groups —
were pressed forcefully and persuasively before the Commis-
sion not only in public hearings but also by other witnesses,
members of the staff, and Commissioners. The Commission
believes the conclusion is inescapable: The effectiveness of
government in meeting urgent national needs, and in bringing
a broader range of our citizens into political participation,
will have much to do with the success of the policies and
programs we recommend in connection with population.

Population problems cannot be dealt with in isolation. Their
solution depends upon understanding and voluntary actions
by many of our people, and neither will be forthcoming in
adequate degree from those who believe that government does
not speak for them and does not respond to their needs.

CHAPTER 7. SOCIAL ASPECTS

In this chapter, we review the relationships between popu-
lation change and several key aspects of our society. A dis-
tinctive feature of a population that is not growing is its relative
abundance of old people and its relative scarcity of youth.
We explore what further shifts in this direction may imply
for the society at large, and the kinds of issues that seem likely
to arise with regard to the status of the aged.

Population changes take place through the family and in
turn react upon it. As our basic institution, the family's
durability may reflect its flexibility in response to transforma-
tions in the society around it We examine recent changes
in the family, looking at the connections between family
behavior and population change, and what social changes
may imply for the responsibilities of family members.

Many expressions of concern over the effects of population
growth include references to a sense that life is becoming
more crowded and congested. We therefore examine the con-
cept of population density, and how density relates to other
factors that influence the character of modern life.

Finally, we show how the status of the socially and eco-
nomically excluded racial and ethnic minorities in our society
is reflected in their fertility and their mortality; and how
achieving the goals of social justice and total inclusion into
the mainstream for these groups will enhance the American
future and will serve the ends of positive population policy as
well.

AGE STRUCTURE

Because of a history of relatively high birthrates in the
United States, our population has characteristically been
"young" compared with that of many European countries.
Over time, however, our population has been growing "older"
because of the long-term downward trend of the birthrate.
Although this trend was interrupted by the postwar baby
boom, the decline in the birthrate since then has caused the
proportion of the population in the childhood ages to be-
come smaller again. As we have indicated, the effects of the
baby boom will be apparent in our age structure throughout
this century, as that generation moves into adulthood and

AGE DISTRIBUTIONS, 1970 AND 2000

Median

Age
(Years)

Percent at Different Ages

Total

Under
18

18-64

65 &
Over

1970

100

.34

2000
2-chfld

family

100

2000
3-chfld
family

100

Stabilized
Population

100

source: U. S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports, Series P-25,
No. 470, "Projections of the Population of the United States by Age and Sex:
1970 to 2000."

the working ages, and in the next century when they join
the ranks of the older citizens.

The future age structure of our population — the proportion
of persons at each age — will be affected by future rates of
fertility. The age structure that would result from the 2-child
and 3-child levels of fertility can be seen in the table on
page 94.

With the 2-child rate of growth throughout the rest of
this century, the age structure would show a consistent pat-
tern of becoming older; with the 3-child rate, the age struc-
ture would become slightly younger. The age structure that
would result from indefinite persistence of a 2-child average —
a stabilized population — would have a median age of 37. In
such a population, the number and percentage of persons in
each group would be roughly the same from birth to age 50

AGE DISTRIBUTION

PERCENT OF TOTAL POPULATION

AGE

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FEMALE

In a stabilized population with low death rates, equal numbers of births and
deaths, and no immigration, the number of 50-year-olds would be nearly as
large as the number of 5-year-olds.

source: Ansley J. Coale, "Alternative Paths to a Stationary Population"
(prepared for the Commission, 1972).

or 60; there would be nearly as many 50-year olds as five-year
olds. Above age 60, the numbers would taper off rapidly
because of the high death rates at the older ages. (See chart on
page 95.)

What are the implications of an older population? Will
changes in our social organization be required? Will the rate
of social and technological change diminish? What are the
advantages and disadvantages of a population whose age
composition is dispersed evenly through the different age
levels?

How we define "old" and "young" is always an arbitrary
matter determined in large part by custom. Only at the lower
and upper age ranges are the functions which people are able
to perform clearly related to biological age. For example, it
could be argued that a more appropriate delineation of the
working age population would be 21 to 70, rather than 18
to 64 years. This would permit a longer period of schooling
and training appropriate to the economy's needs. Also, in a
population with high longevity, health and vitality can be re-
tained until older ages. Sweden, with an older age distribu-
tion than ours, places retirement at 70 rather than 65; India,
with a much younger age structure, places it at 55.

One concern often expressed about an older age structure
is that there will be a larger proportion of the population who
are less adaptable to political and social change, thus sug-
gesting the possibility of "social stagnation."1 Others have
suggested that Sweden and England, both of which have
older age structures than ours, are not especially slow to
change; but, it is difficult to generalize from particular cases.
In any event, other factors, such as accumulated wealth and
level of education, obscure the relationship between chrono-
logical age and resistance to change. For example, older gen-
erations typically grew up in an era of less education; this
gap will narrow in the future.

Each new generation is a potential vehicle for introducing
new patterns into the society. Younger people seem to feel
fewer pressures towards conformity with adult patterns of
thought and behavior. However, the extent of change or the
direction it will take cannot be predicted. Not all new gen-
erations have been equally restive and desirous of major so-
cial and political change; and, where youth have been active
agents of change, the direction of change advocated has
sometimes been oppressive.

Some also speculate that an older population will diminish
rapid job advancement because a larger proportion of the
labor force will be in the older ages and will retain higher

positions longer. In a stabilized population with low mor-
tality, there would be 90 percent as many males and 94 per-
cent as many females at age 50 as at age 20,2 in contrast to
current figures of 63 and 69 percent.8

However, a projection of a stabilized age distribution as-
sumes that zero population growth would be maintained with
little fluctuation in the birthrate. Although such a population
would be older on the average, in reality there could be con-
siderable variation in birthrates around a long-term average
yielding population replacement. This would result in age
groups of different size and more variation in the age struc-
ture than is usually assumed under zero population growth.
Indeed, with increasing individual control over fertility, the
swings in the annual number of births might well be con-
siderable.

Whether opportunities for individual advancement will in
fact diminish will depend obviously on many factors besides
age structure. And, in any event, whether a lower rate of
occupational mobility is viewed with satisfaction or alarm is
largely a matter of values.

Another concern with the changing age composition as-
sociated with lower birthrates is the rising proportion of those
65 and over who, many fear, will add to the burden on pub-
lic funds to care for them. The next section of this report
treats this subject more extensively.

In summary, we are led to the conclusion that the age
structure of a population is unlikely to be decisive in the
forms of social organization which emerge. And, as we have
seen, there are many advantages of population stabilization
which seem clearly to outweigh any fears of an older popu-
lation.

THE AGED

In 1970, there were 20 million persons 65 years old and
over in the United States. With minor improvements in mor-
tality, and with immigration at current levels, the number
expected by the year 2000 is 29 million — a 43-percent in-
crease in the number of these persons. For the remainder
of this century and into the third decade of the next, the
actual numbers in the older ages will be unaffected by future
birthrates, for the people now in this group and those who
will enter it during this interval are already alive. However,

PERSONS 65 AND OVER

For the remainder of this century, the number of persons age 65 and over will
be unaffected by our rate of growth. However, their proportion of the popula-
tion would be affected by how fast the population grows: In the year 2000
they would be 8.9 percent of the population under the 3-child average, and
10.6 percent of the population under the 2-child average.

source: U. S. Bureau of the Census.

their proportion of the population will depend on future birth-
rates.

In 1900, about four percent of our population was 65 years
of age and older.4 This proportion has continued to grow
steadily during the century, reaching 9.8 percent by 1970.
Lower birthrates in the future would further raise the pro-
portion of people in this age group. If the population should
grow at the 2-child rate, the proportion 65 and over would
reach 10.6 percent by the end of this century. If the 2-child
average prevailed until the population ultimately stabilized,
the proportion in this age group would level off at approxi-
mately 16 percent — a rather considerable increase in this
segment of the population. However, if the population grew
at the 3-child rate, in the year 2000 the proportion would be
8.9 percent — less than it is now. (See chart above.)

Public concern for the aged has focused largely on prob-
lems of money and health. Attention was first drawn to the

problems of older people during the 1920's and the early
1930's when it became apparent that families and private
sources of charity no longer provided sufficient support for
the growing numbers of dependent aged, and when the hard-
ships of the economic depression of the 1930's fell dispro-
portionately upon older workers. Similarly, concern with the
health of older people gained momentum during this period,
as increasing numbers of people reached the ages at which
long-term illness is common, presenting new problems for
medical and public health workers.

One consequence was the establishment of our social
security system with subsequent extension of coverage and
benefits to most aged people and the recent addition of medical
care. Numerous public monetary benefits have also gradually
been extended to the aged, including special income tax de-
ductions. Also, greater public resources have been devoted to
research in the chronic diseases, which primarily afflict peo-
ple in the older ages, and to extension of services for the
chronically ill. Pension plans have become more common,
and benefits for those reaching retirement age have been
critical bargaining issues for labor unions.

There are compelling reasons for the continued preoccupa-
tion of society with the income, employment, and health
problems of the aged. Poverty is more prevalent among the
elderly — especially among the aged in minority groups — than
any other age group.5 Not all of those now in the older popu-
lation were covered by the federal Old Age Survivors, Dis-
ability, and Health Insurance program (OASDHI) when
they were in the work force. Furthermore, the levels of pay-
ment under retirement programs have, in many cases, been
low and not sufficient to raise recipients above the poverty
level.

In the future, the income position of the aged will most
likely be improved, because more will be receiving benefits
from private retirement funds, will have larger accumulated
personal resources, and will be covered by government in-
surance plans. Much depends, of course, on our ability to
control inflation. Some might argue that improving the in-
come position of the disadvantaged before they reach old age
would reduce their income deficits in later years. Thus, it
may be decided that national priorities should be focused on
the disadvantaged; for them, income deficits among the elder-
ly, as among all age groups, are greatest, and improvements
have been slowest in coming.

Health needs will continue to figure high on the list of

needs of the older population: Not only will standards of
health care increase; there will also be a change in the age
composition of the older population. While the entire popu-
lation 65 years old and over will rise 43 percent between
1970 and the year 2000, persons 75 to 84 will increase by
65 percent, and those 85 years and over by 52 percent. It
is among these old people that chronic conditions (includ-
ing impairments and disease) increase, limitations of activity
become more prevalent, and institutionalized care is more
often required. Females predominate, for their expectation
of life exceeds that of males. As with income, the risks of
poor health, limitation of activity, and institutionalization are
greater among the disadvantaged segment of the elderly.

The aged are, however, a varied group, and not all have,
or perceive themselves as having, severe income or health
problems. Although their incomes and total wealth are smaller
on the average, the variation in income among the aged is
considerable. The elderly probably require less income and
most probably expect, and accommodate to, some decline in
vigor and health without much difficulty. Even so, the com-
bination of old age with very low income and poor health
is devastating.

Two sets of issues are likely to arise with increasing fre-
quency as the number of very elderly grows. First, there are
the issues of ethics, personal preference, and allocation of
public expenditures connected with prolongation of life. This
set of issues, which is just beginning to receive public atten-
tion, has not been addressed by this Commission.

The second issue, more widely discussed, is far from resolu-
tion. It involves the type of institutional care necessary for
the elderly who can no longer be cared for at home. Only
a small proportion of the population 65 years and over — five
percent in 1970 — are institutionalized,6 but the percentage
among those 85 years and over is much larger. This institu-
tionalized population is relatively disadvantaged in terms of
health, social ties, and economic resources. To date, the pre*
vailing image of institutional life is largely negative, and older
people generally express greater aversion to it than either their
relatives or the public at large.

A continuing problem of the aged in our society is finding
socially valued roles. What is desirable behavior is less clearly
defined for older people than at any other stage in the life
cycle. For men, the situation first becomes critical at retire*
ment. Previously, their life courses were more clearly charted.
After school came entrance into the labor force; their status
in society depended largely on occupational position. After

100

retirement, however, their status, and thus the means for
earning social esteem, becomes indeterminate at best.

For women, the loss of status has traditionally appeared
earlier in the life cycle, when children left home and family
functions diminished. However, a woman's status in society
has depended largely on that of her husband, even though
she may also have been in the work force for all or part of
the time since marriage. Regardless of employment, she typi-
cally maintained household and family roles which forestalled
her feeling of "uselessness."

Opportunities for the employment of men after age 65 are
more favorable for those with higher educational levels, and
for those in a few selected occupations. It remains to be seen
whether patterns of compulsory retirement would be notice-
ably altered with slower population growth and smaller num-
bers of new entrants into the labor market. If the opportuni-
ties for advancement diminish in a population with a stabilized
age distribution, the bargaining position of the aged would
not appear to be strong. Also, increased participation of
women in the work force may present additional competition
for older workers. Finally, society feels litde obligation to pro-
vide employment for older people because of income and
health supports now established in private retirement pro-
grams and in the national social security system.

It is possible, however, that noticeably higher levels of edu-
cational attainment, retraining at different stages of life, and
a shortened work week (perhaps combined with educational
programs) might alter the opportunities for employment — in
the aggregate and for older workers as well.

Policies on age at retirement could certainly be made more
flexible. Perhaps, however, retirement will be looked upon
with more favor once the economic and social supports for
the retirement years are more secure. Much depends on the
extent to which society legitimates leisure-time activity in
comparison with work. If a "leisure ethic" gains greater social
acceptance, especially within the younger portion of the work
force, people may come to look forward to retirement and
the leisure it brings. A man of 65 has an average of 13 years
of life remaining, and a woman 16 years,7 and life expectancy
may rise further with advances in medical science. With the
increase in the number of older persons and the greater
amount of their time available in the future, more considera-
tion should be given to the effective use of volunteers in com-
munity agencies. This could contribute materially to both
the individuals involved and the welfare of the community.

There are many other questions about the aged to consider

101

— for example, where they will live, their position in the
changing family structure, their influence on our political in-
stitutions, and so on. We can only speculate about such
changes. All we know for certain is that, if the birthrate de-
clines further, the proportion of older people will rise. How-
ever, as we have seen, total dependency — the proportion of
aged and children together — will decline, because declines
in the proportion of children will more than offset the rising
proportion of aged. This change will take place gradually,
permitting ample time for planning. We are not doing very
well now in meeting the problems of the aged — we can cer-
tainly do better.

THE FAMILY

We recognize that in opening a discussion of the family
we tread on sacred ground, for the family is our most revered
institution. As the recognized unit of reproduction and child-
rearing, as perhaps the most important socializing agent of
oncoming generations, and for its importance in defining the
social roles of both men and women in our society, it is cen-
tral to most of our concerns.

The record attests to the enormous durability of the family
as a valued institution, modified in response to changing con-
ditions and to the choices available to different generations.
In the United States, most people marry and they marry at
an early age. Our population is unusual among industrialized
nations in that the proportion ever marrying has always been
high for both sexes. Furthermore, this proportion has in-
creased steadily since World War I. Recent generations have
shown a greater inclination to marry than any generation in
the past century.8

Our average age at first marriage is the lowest of any ad-
vanced country in the world. The great divide in the orien-
tation to marriage seems to have come in the 1890's, when
age at marriage started a long downward movement that
lasted, with only minor fluctuations, until the 1960's. In 1959,
the median age at first marriage was 22.5 for men and 20.2
for women; by 1970, these averages had reached 23.2 and
20.8 respectively.9 Thus, in our society, marriage has been
almost universal and the age at entry into marriage has been
low.

While marriage has been almost universal, divorce has be-

102

come more frequent. The divorce rate in 1935 was more than
twice that in 1900, and the rate in 1970 was more than twice
that in 1935.10 It appears that perhaps as many as one-third
of marriages now end in divorce. The increased divorce rate
has often been interpreted as an indication that the institution
of marriage is disintegrating. However, what appears to be
happening is that unsatisfactory marriages are less often tol-
erated. Part of the increase in divorce is due to the fact that
more couples now seek divorce when their marriages fail, in-
stead of remaining separated. Marital dissolution does not
mean rejection of the married state. The evidence for this
is that, increasingly, the divorced marry again.11
an irreversible step. Some evidence supports such a view.

Nearly universal marriage and early marriage in our society
would possibly not be so prevalent had not circumstances
made marriage less of an economic and social commitment
and less of an irreversible step. Some evidence supports such
a view.12 Formerly it was required that the man be able to
provide adequate support for the family before marriage.
Many men, therefore, had to delay marriage and some had
to forego it altogether. Today, however, the proportion of
women in the work force has increased markedly; and the
willingness of women to work after marriage, with or with-
out children, has encouraged many young people to decide
that they could "afford" to marry. Another factor is that, while
marriage once led automatically to children, it no longer needs
to do so. The increased ease and respectability of divorce and
remarriage has likewise reduced the obligation to remain in
an unsatisfactory marriage. Finally, still other factors have
encouraged earlier and more universal marriage — educational
and housing benefits for veterans, federal subsidization of
home ownership, college provision of housing services for
married students, unemployment compensation, and last, but
not least, parental willingness to continue supporting offspring
after they are married.

It would appear that the result of these factors has been
generally to provide a greater range of choice to men than to
women. In quest of a stable relationship, the young woman
often does more than perform her normal duties as wife. She
often interrupts her own education and takes a dead-end job
in order to support the young man while he pursues his edu-
cation. Increasingly she works after marriage to improve the
economic position of the family. It is the woman's respon-
sibilities, and not the man's, which increase if the woman
works, for she must carry family as well as job obligations.
If divorce occurs, it is easier for the man to remarry, and

103

the woman ordinarily is assigned responsibility for the con-
tinuous task of child-rearing, although she may receive finan-
cial assistance from the man. With contraception, the wife
may have fewer children than before, and be fully occupied
with their upbringing for a shorter time after marriage. There-
after, however, she has the problem of coping with her time
and "justifying" her relative inactivity if she does not work.
Men, in general, do not face such major role conflicts until
retirement.

While marriage is the common bond holding the family
unit together, many families are maintained by one parent
only, most often the mother. This may be the case for the
woman who bears a child out of wedlock and does not put
the child up for adoption, or for mothers whose marriages
have been dissolved. In most such instances, however, being
a single parent is a temporary state, for the person, especially
if young, will usually marry or remarry.

Two developments are likely to have an impact on the
family. One is the questioning of existing sex mores by young
people and open violation of them by some. The other is the
women's liberation movement which aims to improve the
status of women and to change role relationships within the
family.

Changes in sex mores have not occurred all at once; they
have been changing for a long time. In many cases, the sex
mores were violated by the parental generation, but not so
openly. And, overt compliance was achieved at considerable
cost, especially in the case of marriages occurring as a result
of premarital pregnancy. This is less necessary now with the
greater availability of contraception and abortion. Also, many
adults are unaware that their own uncertainty and ambivalence
has been a factor in the open repudiation of sexual standards
by youth.

Some believe that the "sexual rebellion" may be moving in
the direction taken in Sweden, where a permissive attitude
towards premarital sexual activity is combined with a late age
at marriage. However, both these traits are traditional in Swe-
den; they are not traditional in the United States. Today, many
young people live together informally and are experimenting
with a greater range of relationships. Whether or not these
relationships are enriching depends on the personal respon-
sibility of individuals involved and the attitudes of our society
toward these individuals and their life styles. The effects on
marriage and family patterns cannot yet be foreseen, and much
depends on how the present confusion with respect to pre-
marital relationships gets resolved.

104

A significant feature of the women's liberation movement is
that, although its demands have been made on the basis of
equity for women, it has not usually been anti-marriage or anti-
children. It has, however, been concerned with changing the
role relationships within families and with extending services
for children. Its most vocal demand, however, is for equality in
the educational and occupational spheres outside the family.

If the movement is successful, many of the role patterns will
be dissolved or weakened. We can expect more conflict within
marriage as to who will do what, but such conflict has already
been apparent in many cases, and many believe that the quality
of child-parent and of husband-wife relationships would be
improved by more participation of the husband in family life.
In those cases where the woman chooses or is required to work,
the division of labor within the family will be based less on sex,
for the husband also will be expected to assume respon-
sibility for household chores, to share in the responsibility of
caring for children, and to accommodate his occupational
requirements to the family roles, much as women do.

None of these changes dictates the direction which reproduc-
tion within families will take, or whether the responsibility for
childbearing and child-rearing will be enhanced, or what will
happen to the quality of family life. As more satisfactory alter-
natives to childbearing and child-rearing become available,
that in itself is likely to enhance rational and responsible deci-
sions about reproduction and parenthood.

POPULATION DENSITY AND POPULATION SIZE

More and more Americans live in urbanized areas at densi-
ties far exceeding those in rural areas, but urban densities are
not increasing. In fact, average density is actually declining,
because urban territory is expanding faster than urban popula-
tion. In 1960, about 96 million people lived in urbanized areas
at an average density of 3,800 people per square mile. By 1970,
118 million people lived in urbanized areas, but the density of
urban areas had dropped to 3,400.13

It is important to distinguish between density and agglomera-
tion. Density, defined as the number of people per unit of area,
does not specify the total number of people involved. Popula-
tion agglomeration refers to large collections of people at an
unspecified density. A small town may have a high density if
the lots are small and the buildings tall. Many suburban areas

105

have a low density but contain a large population distributed
over extensive areas.

We need to understand the effects of urban density itself and
the effects of having such large proportions of our people liv-
ing in areas that include millions of people. What can be said
about "crowding" and its effects? To what extent can social
problems — high crime rates, mental illness, mass violence-
be attributed to density and to the scale at which we live in
metropolitan areas? What will be the social effects of near-
total urbanization?

What is the meaning, in terms of daily life, of urban densi-
ties which can reach as high as 67,000 people per square mile
on Manhattan Island in New York City?14 Without knowing
the context in which it is experienced, the fact of high density
tells us little about its importance or impact on human be-
havior.

High density does not necessarily imply crowding, since the
type of activity a person is engaged in, its duration, and the
person's attitude all shape perception of whether a particular
situation is crowded. The high density at a movie theatre does
not cause a crowded feeling as long as each person has a seat
The same density at an office where people are active would
probably be unbearably crowded. And certainly where a family
of eight lives in three or four rooms the situation is undesirably
crowded. In this case, high density coupled with poor housing
conditions and poor nutrition, can only aggravate an otherwise
difficult situation and seriously hinder the development of chil-
dren. We cannot, however, assume that all high density situa-
tions are either crowded or necessarily bad. Some are, some
are not

Other things being equal, we know that increases in density
cause increases in air pollution as the natural recycling system
is overloaded. Similarly, traffic and other forms of congestion
grow with density, as growing numbers of people hinder each
other's movement. But, other factors, such as population size,
the layout of the city, and its type of transportation system,
are also important.

In general, the research on the effects of population density ]
on human behavior is sparse and the findings either incon-
clusive or negative. Despite popular belief, the evidence is
lacking to show that social pathology is associated with density
itself. The most judicious conclusion we can reach is that little
is known and that conventional measures of density are of
little use as single indicators.

Some intriguing research has been conducted on animals

106

which indicates that certain kinds of anti-social behavior re-
sult from excessive crowding.15 Attempts at similar research
on humans have only begun, and the results are inconclu-
sive. One study, which placed groups of individuals in rooms
of different sizes, showed no effects on the performance of
tasks. Men in such groups evidently became more aggressive
and competitive, but women became more pleasant and less
competitive. With men and women together, all effects of
density disappeared.16

Urban areas and central cities do have higher rates of
crime and mental illness than rural areas, but efforts to im-
plicate population density have been inconclusive. Other fac-
tors, such as income and education appear to be more im-
portant than density itself.17

It is just possible that we may come to look at the decline
in urban densities as a mixed blessing. In suburban areas, one
can identify undesirable consequences of haphazard develop-
ment at densities which are low relative to central cities. If
continued in the decades ahead, declining densities could pro-
duce a serious reduction of available open space where we
can occasionally escape from the pace of urban life.

Many of the concerns about the possible effects of density —
the differences in the quality of life in small towns versus
large cities, the concern about the loss of a sense of com-
munity and individual identity, increasing alienation, and
similar questions — are more properly matters of the scale of
social organization rather than population density. For ex-
ample, concerns about the individual's impact on political
decisions more clearly involve population size and the nature
of political organization than population density.

As the individual becomes a smaller fraction of the total
aggregate, his identification and commitment to the whole
may diminish. But the effect of increasing size on the indi-
vidual's identity depends on many other factors such as the
strength of family, neighborhood, ethnic, religious, and other
organizations in the collection of communities comprising the
metropolis.

Undoubtedly the description of big city life as impersonal
has some validity. In the course of one day, people living in
big cities have contact with many individuals, far too many
to know or even recognize. Indeed, the opportunity for such
contacts is one of the advantages of urban living, since it
facilitates communication and exchange. Under these circum-
stances, anonymity and impersonality are necessary in order
to get through a day's work.

In the space of a single lifetime, we have been transformed

107

from a predominantly rural to a predominantly urban nation.
The effects of living at high densities and in large population
groups are only two demographic dimensions of this trans-
formation. Others might come from the change in composi-
tion of urban population. In the past, our urban places have
grown in part through an influx of people originating in rural
areas. The differences in childhood experiences that rural
people brought with them to the city probably exerted sig-
nificant influence on our urban society. Today, as rural to
urban migration diminishes, the influence of people of rural
origin will soon come to an end. Future generations will be
created from people who have been city-born and city-bred.
For better or for worse, we are becoming a nation of
metropolitan dwellers. The essential point is that the con-
sequences of this are not well known. We ought to be much
more concerned than we seem to be about developing some
reliable knowledge of the social and psychological conse-
quences of urbanization, and the associated implications of
urban densities and the increasing scale and complexity of
social organization accompanying metropolitan agglomera-
tion.

RACIAL AND ETHNIC MINORITIES

Any effort to grasp the dynamics of our population on a
national scale include a serious effort to understand what
is happening among the socially and economically disad-
vantaged racial and ethnic minorities — blacks, Indians, Span-
ish-speaking groups, and others — who are struggling to break
out of the backwaters of our society. We have met with social
scientists, government officials, and spokesmen from these
communities. At best, we have been able to develop only a
broad outline of the intricate role population plays among
the many pressures under which our deprived groups live.
However, this much we can say: This nation cannot hope to
successfully address the question of future population with-
out also addressing the complex network of unemployment,
poor housing, poor health services, and poor education, all
of which combine to act upon, and react to, the pressures of
population.

At the outset, we must recognize that our population prob-
lems cannot be resolved simply by inducing our "have-not"
groups to limit the number of children they have. Although

108

the fertility of minority groups is higher than that of the rest
of the population, it is not they who bear the primary re-
sponsibility for population growth.

Despite their higher fertility rates, minorities — precisely
because of their smaller numbers — contribute less to popula-
tion growth than does the rest of the population. Among
all women 35 to 44 years old in 1969, the Spanish-speaking,
Indians, and blacks together contributed 30 percent of the
childbearing in excess of replacement needs, while the non-
Spanish-speaking white majority contributed 70 percent.18
An estimate for 1967 indicates that well over half of all child-
bearing in excess of replacement needs was attributable to the
nonpoor, non-Spanish, white majority.19 Looking at it an-
other way, if no babies had been born to black or Spanish-
speaking parents throughout the decade of the sixties, our
population would be only four percent smaller than it is
today. On the other hand, if there had been no births to non-
Spanish-speaking whites, our present population would be 13
percent less.20

The idea that our population growth is primarily fueled by
the poor and the minorities having lots of babies is a myth.
There is nonetheless a strong relationship between high fer-
tility and the economic and social problems that afflict the 13
percent of our people who are poor, and we must address it.

In the first place, the link between birthrates and poverty
is so tight that family size in general is a good indicator of
how far into the mainstream of American life a group has
moved. The largest families are among our rural ethnic, low
income, and cultural minorities, regardless of race. They in-
clude southern Appalachian whites, southern blacks, Mexi-
can-Americans, American Indians, and other groups.

As these groups move into the mainstream, their family
size diminishes. For example, blacks with high school diplomas
have about the same number of children as their white coun-
terparts; college-educated blacks have even fewer children,
on the average, than their white counterparts.21 Mexican-
American fertility also declines in response to increased edu-
cation.22

In the second place, the sordid history of race relations
in our nation has left a widely felt legacy of fear and sus-
picion that will poison any population policy unless it is clear
that such a policy is being developed to enhance the quality
of life for all Americans, and not to restrict or curtail the
gains made by minorities. As Dr. Eugene S. Callender, presi-
dent of the New York Urban Coalition, told us:

109

Minority groups must share the generally growing con-
cern for the quality of life available to us as the popu-
lation increases. However, it must also be kept in mind
that minority groups have only recently been allowed to
become participants in this system, to receive its benefits
and to share in shaping its future. We are even more
anxious about our position within the society, since our
few gains are, even now, tenuous.23

The fragility of these gains, coupled with the record of white
America in relation to nonwhite and Spanish-speaking mi-
norities, practically assures, Dr. Callender added, that any
governmental efforts in the field of "population" will be
viewed with distrust if not outright alarm:

Within this country, Blacks, Indians, Chicanos, Puerto
Ricans, and Orientals feel that such [population] control
is solely to the advantage of the majority population.
Minority groups at this point in history do not feel that
they can afford to trust that the "nobler instincts" of the
white majority will prohibit the resurgence of subtle and
overt forms of racism.

This wariness is reinforced by a belief that population is
of particular interest to affluent whites, and is irrelevant to the
everyday survival problems faced by blacks and other mi-
nority groups. A witness at our Washington hearings told us
that many blacks believe that whites who once joined them
in battles against discrimination did so more out of the excite-
ment of joining a "cause" than because of opposition to racial
and social injustice. As the battles grew more difficult, whites
tired of the effort and now have turned to a new cause —
ecology — which blacks consider a copout from the real prob-
lems blacks face. As one witness at our Washington hearings
noted, "what few white liberals which were left after the 'back-
lash' have gone traipsing off after daisies and low-phosphate
detergents." This witness added:

If this [ecology] movement also talks about fewer people,
the question of "who gets to survive" is raised. So, to us,
it becomes "every man for himself" now, because we
have no reason to expect that we won't get the worst of
this one too.24

This feeling of powerlessness, of exclusion, has led some
spokesmen to suggest that the only way to break into the

110

"system" is by growing so large in numbers that they can no
longer be ignored. As we learned from a Spanish-speaking
witness at our hearings in Los Angeles, the apparent lack of
majority responsiveness leads Spanish-speaking people to be-
lieve that, ". . . the only way we will get groups like yours
to be responsive to our needs is through sheer weight of num-
bers." It may be, he added, that "what we must do is to en-
courage large Mexican-American families so that we will
eventually be so numerous that the system will either respond
or it will be overwhelmed."25

The Reverend Jesse Jackson reminded us in Chicago that
the basic drives among all people are for food, clothing,
shelter, recognition, and security. He added that:

. . . You have to recognize that the American group that
has been subjected to as much harassment as our com-
munity has is suspect of any programs that would have
the effect of either reducing or levelling off our popula-
tion growth. Virtually all the security we have is in the
number of children we produce.26

The political success of blacks in Newark, New Jersey,
Gary, Indiana, and elsewhere are cited by Jackson and others
to indicate that continued growth in their communities is
required to assure not only survival, but political leverage
as well.

However, our public opinion survey revealed that most
black people believe continued growth is a problem for this
nation. Fifty-one percent said population growth is a serious
problem, another 35 percent termed it a problem but not so
serious, and 10 percent said it was no problem at all.27

While excess fertility among blacks and other minorities
is not the main source of the problem of national population
growth, nonetheless it is clear that many minority families
regard excess fertility as a serious personal problem. The
evidence for this is the response of minority families to family
planning services when these are made available in an ac-
ceptable manner. Like other groups, minority members seek
to limit their family size as a means of achieving a better
quality of life for themselves and their children.

Americans, regardless of their racial or ethnic backgrounds,
tend to have smaller families as their education, their jobs,
and their incomes improve. However, those who have not
been able to climb onto the socioeconomic escalator have
also not adopted the pattern of smaller family size. Hence,
unblocking our minorities and enabling them to get into the

111

mainstream is going to have a significant effect upon future
population levels.

Historically, there has been a close link between urbaniza-
tion and upward social and economic mobility. But this link
has broken down for blacks, the Spanish-speaking, Indians,
and other "have-not" groups. For whites, the descendants
of immigrants or migrants have done better than their par-
ents. The first arrivals may have taken jobs in factories or on
the docks, but they had children who finished high school
and went into skilled occupations, and grandchildren who
finished college and moved into the professional ranks — and
out of the central cities into the suburbs.

There is no question that black people who move from
farm to city are better off than those who stay on the farm.
The city is where they go for jobs and educational oppor-
tunities that simply are not available in rural areas. The
problem is that subsequent advances have not come to them
as they have come to the majority.

Even though blacks are narrowing the education gap, they
are not faring as well economically. In fact, the better edu-
cated a black becomes, the worse grows the income gap be-
tween himself and a comparably educated white.* For ex-
ample, in 1969, the median income for men with an eighth
grade education was $4,300 among blacks and $5,500 among
whites — a difference of $1,200. For those with high school
diplomas, black men had a median income of $6,100, whites
$8,600 — a difference of $2,500. Among college graduates,
black men earned median incomes of $8,600, which was
$3,800 below the $12,400 earned by whites. The black col-
lege graduate in 1969 was earning no more than a white with
a high school diploma.28 For men of Spanish origin, the 1970
median income was $6,000 compared with $8,200 for all
whites and $5,000 for blacks.29

Those minority people who have "made it" into the system
have adopted the small-family pattern. The problem is Jhat
so few of them have made it. The task is to make the system
work for them as it has for the majority.

If the facts of life for blacks and many other minorities
are grim — the facts of death are no better. Blacks live, on the
average, seven years less than whites, though this is not as
bad as the turn of the century when the gap in life expectancy
was 15 years.30 Current differences are due primarily to pre-
mature death among black adults between the ages of 20 to

*A separate statement on this point by Commissioner D. Gale John-
son appears on pages 286-287.

112

60, and. secondarily to higher mortality among black chil-
dren.31 The sources of this higher black mortality is found
in the social and economic facts we have already noted.

A Houston case study showed that the number of deaths
in 1960 among Mexican-Americans was 12 percent higher for
males, and 67 percent higher for females than would have
been the case if they had been subject to the death rates ex-
perienced by non-Spanish whites. The corresponding figures for
excess mortality in Houston's black population were 43 percent
for males and 87 percent for females.32 National figures show
that total mortality among Indians exceeds white mortality by
50 percent.83

The existence of large differences in mortality by socio-
economic level within minority populations suggests that the
excess mortality of these groups can be largely reduced with
improvements in levels of living.34

In Little Rock, Arkansas, a black man confronted us with
a more basic issue: Do we, as a society, want to improve con-
ditions for the poor and the excluded? He questioned whether
we do:

I suggest to you that many of us who are advantaged have
a vested interest in keeping the disadvantaged exactly
where they are. Our economic and political strategies are
clearly designed to keep a segment of our population
poor and powerless. I suggest that many of our social
welfare programs have failed and are failing to help the
poor and oppressed among us because they were never
intended to help them.35

The decade 1960 to 1970 saw a doubling of the number of
young black men and women aged 15 to 24 in the metro-
politan areas of every part of the nation except the south.36
This increase, twice that for comparable white youth, was
the result of higher black fertility to begin with, participation
in the post-World War II baby boom, and continued migra-
tion away from southern rural poverty. The result has been
more and more young black people ill-equipped to cope with
the demands of urban life, more likely to wind up unemployed
or in dead-end, low-paying jobs, and caught in the vicious
wheel of poverty, welfare, degradation, and crime.

The facts we have cited describe a crisis for our society.
They add up to a demographic recipe for more turmoil in
our cities, more bitterness among our "have-nots," and
greater divisiveness among all of our peoples. What we have
said here means that unless we address our major domestic

113

social problems in the short run — beginning with racism and
poverty — we will not be able to resolve fully the question of
population growth. And, unless we can resolve the question
of population growth, in the long run it not only will further
aggravate our current problems, but may eventually dwarf
them.

114

CHAPTER 8. POPULATION AND
PUBLIC POLICY

We have reviewed population trends in the United States
and examined their implications. Now we are ready to talk
about the meaning of these trends for policy.

Four things stand out: First, the effects of our past rapid
growth are going to be with us a long time. Second, we have
to make a choice about our future growth. Third, the choice
involves nothing less than the quality of American life. And,
fourth, slower population growth provides opportunities to
improve the quality of life, but special efforts are required if
the opportunities are to be well used.

A LEGACY OF GROWTH

Regardless of what happens to the birthrate from now on,
our past growth commits us to substantial additional growth
in the future. At a minimum, we will probably add 50 million
more Americans by the end of the century, and the figure
could easily be much higher than that.

We will be living for a long time with the consequences of
the baby boom. Not long ago, that surge of birth caused dou-
ble sessions, school in trailers, and a teacher shortage. Now
it is crowding the colleges and swelling the number of people
looking for jobs. As these young people grow older, they

115

will enter the ranks of producers as well as consumers, and
they will eventually reenter dependency — the dependency of
the aged.

We are going to have to plan for this. Swelling numbers of
job applicants put an extra burden on full employment policy,
if only because failure in this respect now affects so many
more people than it did once. This will continue to be true
for many years. People think the "baby boom" ended in the
1950's. Not so. This was only when it reached its peak. The
last year when births exceeded four million was 1964, only
eight years ago. In fact, today's eight-year-olds are just as
numerous as 18-year-olds. So it is not too late to try to do
better by the youngest of the baby-boom babies than we did
by the oldest.

The baby boom is not over. The babies have merely grown
older. It has become a boom in the teens and twenties. In a
few decades, it will be turning into a retirement boom. During
the second decade of the next century, 30 million people will
turn 65, compared with 15 million who had their 65th birth-
day in the past 10 years. Will the poverty of the aged be with
us then? Census Bureau reports disclose that 25 percent of
today's aged are in poverty, compared with eight percent of
people in the young working ages of 22 to 45. Thirty years
from now, will we do better by the swelling numbers of aged
than we do by those we have now? Will we develop alterna-
tives to treating the elderly as castoffs? Not if we don't try.
Not if we don't plan for it.

We may be through with the past, but the past is not done
with us. Our demographic history shapes the future, even
though it does not determine it. It sets forth needs as well as
opportunities. It challenges us to get ready. While we cannot
predict the future, much of it is foreseeable. For this much,
at least, we should be prepared

THE CHOICE ABOUT FUTURE GROWTH

We have to make a choice about our future growth. As a
Commission, we have formed a definite judgment about the
choice the nation should make. We have examined the effects
that future growth alternatives are likely to have on our
economy, society, government, resources, and environment,
and we have found no convincing argument for continued
national population growth. On the contrary, the plusses seem

116

to be on the side of slowing growth and eventually stopping
it altogether. Indeed, there might be no reason to fear a
decline in population once we are past the period of growth
that is in store.

Neither the health of our economy nor the welfare of in-
dividual businesses depend on continued population growth.
In fact, the average person will be markedly better off in terms
of traditional economic values if population growth slows
down than if it resumes the pace of growth experienced in the
recent past.

With regard to both resources and the environment, the
evidence we have assembled shows that slower growth would
conserve energy and mineral resources and would be a sig-
nificant aid in averting problems in the areas of water supply,
agricultural land supply, outdoor recreation resources, and
environmental pollution.

Slower population growth can contribute to the nation's
ability to solve its problems in these areas by providing an
opportunity to devote resources to the quality of life rather
than its quantity, and by "buying time" — that is, slowing the
pace at which problems accumulate so as to provide oppor-
tunity for the development of orderly and democratic solu-
tions.

For government, slower population growth offers potential
benefits in the form of reduced pressures on educational and
other services; and, for the people, it enhances the potential
for improved levels of service in these areas. We find no threat
to national security from slower growth. While population
growth is not by any means the sole cause of governmental
problems, it magnifies them and makes their solution more
difficult. Slower growth would lessen the increasing rate of
strain on our federal system. To that extent it would enhance
the likelihood of achieving true justice and more ample well-
being for all citizens even as it would preserve more individual
freedom.

Each one of the impacts of population growth — on the
economy, resources, the environment, government, or society
at large — indicates the desirability, in the short run, for a
slower rate of growth. And, when we consider these together,
contemplate the ever-increasing problems involved in the long
run, and recognize the long lead time required to arrest
growth, we must conclude that continued population growth
— beyond that to which we are already committed by the
legacy of the baby boom — is definitely not in the interest of
promoting the quality of life in the nation.

117

THE QUALITY OF AMERICAN LIFE

We are concerned with population trends only as they
impede or enhance the realization of those values and goals
cherished in, by, and for American society.

What values? Whose goals? As a Commission, we do not
set ourselves up as an arbiter of those fundamental questions.
Over the decades ahead, the American people themselves
will provide the answers, but we have had to judge proposals
for action on population-related issues against their contri-
bution to some version of the good life for this society and,
for that matter, the world. What we have sought are measures
that promise to move demographic trends in the right direc-
tion and, at the same time, have favorable direct effects on
the quality of life.

We know that problems of quality exist from the variety
of indicators that fall short of what is desirable and possible.
There are inequalities in the opportunities for life itself evi-
denced by the high frequency of premature death and the
lower life expectancy of the poor. There is a whole range of
preventable illness such as the currently high and rising rate
of venereal disease. There are a number of congenital de-
ficiencies attributable to inadequate prenatal care and obstet-
rical services and, in some cases, to genetic origin. Not all
such handicaps are preventable, but they occur at rates higher
than if childbearing were confined to ages associated with
low incidence and if genetic counseling were more widely
available.

Innate human potential often has not been fully developed
because of the inadequate quality of various educational,
social, and environmental factors. Particularly with regard
to our ethnic minorities and the female half of the population,
there are large numbers of people occupying social roles that
do not capitalize on their latent abilities and interest, or elicit
a dedicated effort and commitment. There is hunger and mal-
nutrition, particularly damaging to infants and young children,
that should not be tolerated in the richest nation the world
has ever known. Sensitive observers perceive in our population
a certain frustration and alienation that appears to go beyond
what is endemic in the human condition; the sources of these
feeling should be explored and better understood.

And we can also identify and measure the limiting factors,

118

the inequalities of opportunity, and the environmental haz-
ards that give rise to such limitations in the quality of life —
for example, inadequate distribution of and access to health,
education, and welfare services; cultural and social constraints
on human performance and development associated with
race, ethnic origin, sex, and age; barriers to full economic
and cultural participation; unequal access to environmental
quality; and unequal exposure to environmental hazard.

There are many other problems of quality in American
life. Thus, alongside the challenges of population growth and
distribution is the challenge of population quality. The goal
of all population policy must be to make better the life that is
actually lived

OPPORTUNITY AND CHOICE

While slower population growth provides opportunities, it
does not guarantee that they will be well used. It simply opens
up a range of choices we would not have otherwise. Much de-
pends on how wisely the choices are made and how well the
opportunities are used. For example, slower population growth
would enable us to provide a far better education for children
at no increase in total costs. We want the opportunity presented
by slower growth to be used this way, but we cannot guarantee
that it will be. The wise use of opportunities such as this de-
pends on public and private decisions yet to be made.

Slowing population growth can "buy time" for the solution
of many problems; but, without the determined, long-range
application of technical and political skills, the opportunity
will be lost. For example, our economic and political systems
reward the exploitation of virgin resources and impose no
costs on polluters. The technology exists for solving many of
these problems. But proper application of this technology will
require the recognition of public interests, the social inventive-
ness to discover institutional arrangements for channeling
private interests without undue government regulation, and
the political courage and skill needed to institute the necessary
changes.

Slower population growth offers time in which to accom-
plish these things. But if all we do with breathing time is
breathe, the value of the enterprise is lost.

Population change does not take place in a vacuum. Its con-
sequences are produced through its joint action with tech-

119

nology, wealth, and the institutional structures of society.
Hence, a study of the American future, insofar as it is influ-
enced by population change, cannot ignore, indeed it must
comment upon, the features of the society that make popula-
tion growth troublesome or not.

Hence, while we are encouraged by the improvement in
average income that will be yielded by slower population
growth, we are concerned with the persistence of vast differ-
ences in the distribution of income, which has remained fixed
now for a quarter of a century.

While we are encouraged by the relief that slower popula-
tion growth offers in terms of pressure on resources and the
environment, we are aware of the inadequacy of the nation's
general approach to these problems.

We rely largely on private market forces for conducting the
daily business of production and consumption. These work
well in general and over the short run to reduce costs, hus-
band resources, increase productivity, and provide a higher
material standard of living for the individual. But the market
mechanism has been ineffective in allocating the social and
environmental costs of production and consumption, primari-
ly because public policies and programs have not provided
the proper signals nor required that such costs be borne by
production and consumption activities. Nor has the market
mechanism been able to provide socially acceptable incomes
for people who, by virtue of age, incapacity, or injustice, are
poorly equipped to participate in the market system for pro-
ducing and distributing income.

Our economy's use of the earth's finite resources, and the
accompanying pollution or deterioration of the quality of
water, air, and natural beauty, has neglected some of the
fundamental requirements for acceptable survival. Often the
time horizon for both public and private decisions affecting
the economy has been too short It seems clear that market
forces alone cannot be relied upon to achieve our social and
environmental goals, for reasons that make exchange, though
the main organizing principle, inadequate without appropriate
institutional and legal underpinnings.

In short, even if we achieve the stabilization of population,
our economic, environmental, governmental, and social prob-
lems will still be with us unless by will and intelligence we
develop policies to deal with the other sources of these prob-
lems. The fact that such policies have shown little conspicuous
success in the past gives rise to the skepticism we have ex-
pressed above in our discussion of the relations between gov-
ernment and population growth.

120

The problem is not so much the impact of population on
government as the adequacy of government to respond to the
challenge of population and the host of issues that surround it.
Long-term planning is necessary to deal with environmental
and resource problems, but there are only beginning signs that
government is motivated or organized to undertake it. A major
commitment is required to bring minorities into the main-
stream of American life, but the effort so far is inadequate.
It is clear that the "real city" that comprises the metropolis
requires a real government to manage its affairs ; but the nation
is still trying to manage the affairs of complex, interconnected,
metropolitan communities with fragmented institutional struc-
tures inherited from the 18th century.

Population, then, is clearly not the whole problem. But it
is clearly part of the problem, and it is the part given us as the
special responsibility of this Commission. How policy in this
area should be shaped depends on how we define the objectives
of policy in respect to population.

POLICY GOALS

Ideally, we wish to develop recommendations worthwhile
in themselves, which at the same time, speak to population
issues. These recommendations are consistent with American
ethical values in that they aim to enhance individual freedom
while simultaneously promoting the common good. It is im-
portant to reiterate that our policy recommendations embody
goals either intrinsically desirable or worthwhile for reasons
other than demographic objectives.

Moreover, some of the policies we recommend are irreversi-
ble in a democratic society, in the sense that freedoms once
introduced cannot be rescinded lightly. This irreversibility
characterizes several of the important policies recommended
by this Commission. We are not really certain of the demo-
graphic impact of some of the changes implied by our recom-
mendations. One or two could conceivably increase the birth-
rate by indirectly subsidizing the bearing of children. The rest
may depress the birthrate below the level of replacement. We
are not concerned with this latter contingency because, if
sometime in the future the nation wishes to increase its popu-
lation growth, there are many possible ways to try this; a na-
tion's growth should not depend on the ignorance and mis-

121

fortune of its citizenry. In any event, it is naive to expect that
we can fine-tune such trends.

In the broadest sense, the goals of the population policies
we recommend aim at creating social conditions wherein the
desired values of individuals, families, and communities can
be realized; equalizing social and economic opportunities for
women and members of disadvantaged minorities; and en-
hancing the potential for improving the quality of life.

At the educational level, we wish to increase public aware-
ness and understanding of the implications of population
change and simultaneously further our knowledge of the causes
and consequences of population change.

In regard to childbearing and child-rearing, the goals of our
recommendations are to: (1) maximize information and
knowledge about human reproduction and its implications for
the family; (2) improve the quality of the setting in which
children are raised; (3) neutralize insofar as it is practicable
and consistent with other values those legal, social, and institu-
tional pressures that historically have been mainly pronatalist
in character; and (4) enable individuals to avoid unwanted
childbearing, thereby enhancing their ability to realize their
preferences. These particular policies are aimed at facilitating
the social, economic, and legal conditions within our society
wrhich increase ethical responsibility and the opportunity for
unbiased choice in human reproduction and child-rearing. At
the same time, by enhancing the individual's opportunity to
make a real choice between having few children and having
many, between parenthood and childlessness, and between
marriage and the single state, these policies together will un-
doubtedly slow our rate of population growth and accelerate
the advent of population stabilization.

In connection with the geographic distribution of popula-
tion, our objectives are to ease and guide the process of popu-
lation movement, to facilitate planning for the accommodation
of movements, and to increase the freedom of choice in resi-
dential locations.

To these ends, therefore, we offer our recommendations in
the belief that the American people, collectively and individ-
ually, should confront the issues of population growth and
reach deliberate informed decisions about the family's and
society's size as they affect the achievement of personal and
national values.

122

CHAPTER 9. EDUCATION

One characteristic American response to social issues is to
propose educational programs, and this Commission is no ex-
ception. The range of educational topics impinging on popu-
lation is broad and diffuse; somewhat arbitrarily, we have
elected to organize the subject into three categories: popula-
tion education, education for parenthood, and sex education.
This is not the only way to organize this material. It is for the
individual community, school, or agency to decide what is
appropriate and wise for them in preparing such educational
programs.

POPULATION EDUCATION

If Americans now and in future generations are to make
rational, informed decisions about their own and their de-
scendants' future, they must be provided with far more knowl-
edge about population change and its implications than they
now possess.* The amount and accuracy of information cur-
rently held by Americans on the subject of population leave
much to be desired. Approximately six out of 10 questioned
in our 1971 poll either did not know or could not guess the
size of the United States population within 50 million persons
(205 million in 1970). And among young persons between

* A separate statement by Commissioner Alan Cranston appears on
pages 268-269.

123

16 and 21, many of whom are still in school, the proportion
answering correctly rises only a couple of percentage points.
The record is even worse with respect to information about
the world's population. Only 16 percent know or can guess the
size of the world's population within one-half billion persons
(3.6 billion in 1970). If information on such elementary facts
is missing, one can imagine the state of more advanced knowl-
edge and understanding.1

Population education involves more than simply learning
the size of different populations. Ideally, it includes some ele*
mentary knowledge of the arithmetic of population growth
and the growth of metropolitan areas and suburban decentral-
ization. A program of population education should seek to
present knowledge about population processes, population
characteristics, the causes of population change, and the con-
sequences of such change for the individual and for the society.
We believe that population education should not approach
population as a "problem" to be solved or as a point of view
to be promoted. The goal of population education is to incor-
porate concepts and materials related to population into the
school curriculum in order to educate future generations, en-
abling them to make more intelligent decisions with regard
to population matters.2

Although some students are exposed to a smattering of
population content in courses such as geography and biology,
there is hardly any systematic coverage of the topic.

There is no evidence that anything approaching an ade-
quate population education program now exists in our schools.
Very few teachers are trained in the subject and textual ma-
terials are scant and inadequate.

Teachers can be trained in the content of the population
field and in the methods of population education, through pre-
service and in-service programs, summer institutes and work-
shops, the development of mobile teams of specialists, and
other special programs. Some beginnings in this direction have
already been made.

It is, of course, understandable that schools are under
enormous pressure to incorporate in their curriculum many
new topics ranging from driver education to drug education.
The techniques for incorporating population materials into
other courses will have to be explored.

Congress has begun to recognize the need for population
education. Population is among the subjects that may be in-
cluded in programs funded under the Environmental Edu-
cation Act of 1970. P.L. 91-572, the Family Planning Serv-
ices and Population Research Act, contains an authorization

124

of $1.25 million in fiscal year 1973 for family planning and
population information and education.

However, the Environmental Education Act is seriously
underfunded; and population education, which is only a small
element of the program, is unlikely ever to receive adequate
attention under the present legislation. The Office of Educa-
tion, which administers the environmental education pro-
gram, has not been an enthusiastic advocate of population
education. This situation might change if adequate authority
and funding became available for such a program.

Although Congress authorized funding of population edu-
cation under P.L. 91-572, in the first two years no funds
have been made available under the Act for this purpose. In
fiscal year 1973, the Department of Health, Education and
Welfare has requested $170,000 for population education. In
a paper prepared for the Commission, one expert estimated
that federal funds amounting to $25 million over the next
three years are needed in this field.

Responsibility for coordinating activities in population edu-
cation has recently been assigned to the Deputy Assistant
Secretary for Population Affairs. This represents an initial
step toward establishing quality programs in population edu-
cation. The Commission suggests that, as activity in the field
of population education expands, it may be necessary to re-
view periodically the location of this responsibility.

In view of the important role that education can play in
developing an understanding of the causes and consequences
of population growth and distribution, the Commission rec*
ommends enactment of a Population Education Act to assist
school systems in establishing well-planned population edur
cation programs so that present and future generations will
be better prepared to meet the challenges arising from
population change.

To implement such a program, the Commission recom*
mends that federal funds be appropriated for teacher
training, for curriculum development and materials
preparation, for research and evaluation, for the support
of model programs, and for assisting state departments
of education to develop competence and leadership in
population education.

At the college level, a recent survey of 537 accredited four-
year institutions in the United States indicated that nearly

125

half offer a course in demography or population problems.
Variation by type of institution was considerable, with only
one-fifth of the Catholic schools, but two-thirds of the state
or municipal schools offering a population course.3 In reality,
only a small fraction of the college population is exposed to
formal coursework in demography. The Commission feels that
a useful way to increase this exposure would be to include
population in the large introductory social science courses
offered by all colleges and universities. Additionally, exhibits,
lectures, and programs sponsored by campus groups would
serve to increase student awareness of population questions.

EDUCATION FOR PARENTHOOD

Life in the future will depend significantly on the charac-
teristics of our children. The Commission's interest is not
limited to the number of children in our population, but ex-
tends to a concern for the quality of their development. How
adequately are we raising our children, and how can we insure
that parents and children are given the opportunity for self-
fulfillment?

There is a diversity of styles of family life in America today.
It includes the conventional nuclear family (parents and chil-
dren) along with extended families and experiments in com-
munal living. In addition, a great many of the traditional
functions of the family are being assumed by other institu-
tions. Although its functions diminish and its size and form
change, the family as a basic social institution shows little
sign of obsolescence. The family remains the primary environ-
ment for the physical, emotional, social, and intellectual de-
velopment of children. The home continues to be the focus
for learning about parenthood. Children are constantly being
educated for their future roles as parents by the examples set
for them. The infant shares in the loving environment of his
home; the young child learns discipline and the daily activities
of family life; the teenager begins to understand the respon-
sibilities involved in the creation of a home.

Since the overwhelming majority of Americans marry and
have children, we tend to overlook the fact that we are not
all equally suited for parenthood any more than we are for
teaching school or playing various sports. Matters of tempera-
ment, age, health, and competing interests, to mention just a
few, are considerations in determining whether or not to have

126

children. For most people, choosing to remain childless is
not a real option. Our society should enlarge its tolerance
and accept, without stigma, those individuals who choose not
to become parents.

Costs of Children4

At the same time, the Commission considers it important
for parents and prospective parents to have some understand-
ing of the implications of their reproductive decisions for
themselves and their children. The benefits and rewards of
children are well known, but not many recognize the emo-
tional and financial costs involved. For many young people,
becoming a parent represents a greater change in their lives
than does marriage; and they are unprepared for the emo-
tional demands of parenthood or the impact of each additional
child on the family unit.

Although many couples have only a vague idea of the finan-
cial costs of a child, more and more parents are enlarging
their expectations for their children. This change in expecta-
tions has meant a change in costs. Parents today, in addition
to paying for the birth and rearing of a child, may also bear
the costs of a college education. The costs of raising a child
from birth through college, without including the costs borne
by the public sector, are estimated in the table on page 128.
As substantial as these are, the direct cost is only part of the
total. With the birth of a child, one parent — usually the
woman — will tend to spend more time at home, thereby giving
up the income which she otherwise would have earned. Today,
with more women better educated and having better jobs, the
earnings a woman foregoes due to the birth of a child are
often substantial. Depending on her educational background,
a woman's loss of earnings over a period of 14 years due to
the birth of her first child might be as high as $60,000. Al-
though she will forego less in the way of earnings with subse-
quent children, the loss of income, combined with the costs
of raising a family, may place a heavy financial burden on
the parents. Information on the costs to the family of raising
a child is an important part of education for parenthood. With
some idea of the financial demands of children, parents can
plan ahead and be better prepared to provide the kind of life
they want for their children.

Another type of cost for many individuals and their chil-
dren are the disadvantages that result from early childbear-
ing. Infants of young mothers, especially those under 19 years

127

The Total Cost of a Child, 1969

Discounted

Undiscounteda

Cost of giving birth

$ 1,534

Cost of raising a child

17,576

32,830

Cost of college education

1,244

5,560

Total direct cost

20,354

39,924

Opportunity costs for the
average womanb

39,273

58,437

Total costs of a first child

$59,627

$98,361

•Discounted and undiscounted costs — spending $1,000 today costs more than
spending $1,000 over a 10-year period because of the nine years of potential
interest on the latter. This fact is allowed for in the discounted figures by
assuming interest earned annually on money not spent in the first year. True
costs are not accurately reflected in the undiscounted estimates, for these are
simply accumulations of total outlays without regard to the year in which they
must be made.

b Depending on the educational background of the mother, the opportunity
costs (earnings foregone by not working) could be higher or lower.

source: Ritchie H. Reed and Susan Mcintosh, "Costs of Children" (prepared
for the Commission, 1972).

of age, are subject to higher risks of prematurity, mortality,
and serious physical and intellectual impairments than are
children of mothers 20 to 35. Despite a downward trend, a
quarter of American girls who recently reached their twen-
tieth birthday had already borne a child. Moreover, the mother,
father, and child are more likely to be disadvantaged in social
and economic terms than are couples who postpone child-
bearing at least until the mother is in her twenties.5 In addi-
tion, a recent government report indicates that the probability
of divorce is considerably higher for couples married when
the wife is younger than 20 years old.6

Family Life Education

The decision to marry and the decision to bring a child into
the world should not be made lightly. Both marriage and

128

parenthood should imply a deep personal commitment and a
continuing emotional investment. As a nation, we have a re»
sponsibility to provide better preparation for parenthood. At
the present time, some school systems throughout the country
have included family life courses in their curriculum. The
Catholic Church has been in the forefront in family life edu-
cation and is working to inform children and their parents
on issues involved in family living. Programs in home eco-
nomics similarly provide training for marriage and parent-
hood. The subject matter of these courses is extremely vari-
able, including topics on the functions of the family in human
history and in modern industrial society, nutrition and home
management, the physiology of reproduction, the physical and
emotional relationships involved in dating and marriage, and
the roles of family members, including discussions of the
changing status of women and patterns of child-rearing. Sup-
plementary to these school programs are the efforts of com-
munity groups, such as the Red Cross, in training and guid-
ing prospective parents. In regard to parent education, the
White House Conference on Children concludes:

Where parent education does occur, it is typically pre-
sented in vicarious forms through reading and discussion,
. . . Excellent preparation for parenthood can be given to
school-age children through direct experience under ap-
propriate supervision, in caring for and working with
those younger than themselves,7

The mass media are a potent educational force in our so-
ciety. American children and adults spend an estimated aver-
age of 27 hours a week watching television.8 They also spend
large amounts of time reading newspapers and magazines,
listening to the radio, and going to movies. Family life, as
depicted in soap operas, situation comedies, and romantic
magazines and films, bears little resemblance to that experi-
enced by most of the population. In our judgment, the media
should assume more responsibility in presenting information
and education for family living to the public.

In proportion to the number of individuals who are and
will become parents, our educational effort is insufficient. The
Commission believes that community agencies, especially the
school, should become more sensitive to the need for prepara-
tion for parenthood and should include appropriate subject
matter in their programs. We observe that there is informa-
tion and expertise in the various aspects of family life scat-
tered throughout the public and private sector. The Com-

129

mission suggests that the Department of Health, Education p
and Welfare provide financial support for programs designed
to examine and coordinate existing information activities and
resources in this field.

If one of our goals is to maximize the opportunities for
parents and their children, the concept of education for
parenthood goes beyond the provision of courses in family
life. The field expands to considerations of maternal and child
health, the emotional and physical conditions under which
we raise our children, and finally the genetic endowment
with which the young will develop. Discussion and recom-
mendations on issues of maternal and child health are found
in Chapter 11.

Nutrition9

The existence of hunger and malnutrition in the United
States is well known. Although it is difficult to separate nutri-
tion from the total physical, social, and biological environ-
ment, the Director of the National Nutrition Survey estimates
that there may be more than 10 million malnourished Ameri-
cans among the poor. Of these, approximately 40 percent are
children. Of all the children surveyed, 15 percent showed evi-
dence of growth retardation — an anticipated result, since mal-
nutrition is known to inhibit the normal growth process.10

Experts have stated that, "... if malnutrition persists dur-
ing the first few years of life, the child is doomed to fore-
shortened physical and mental development, increased sus-
ceptibility to infection and impaired response to his environ-
ment.11

Malnutrition is not only a threat to growth and develop-
ment, it endangers life itself. Scientists have shown that mal-
nutrition directly increases the mortality rate of pregnant
women and, indirectly, of infants; maternal malnutrition is
a major cause of immaturity and prematurity among infants.
Between one-half and three-fourths of all children who die
in the first four weeks of life are premature. A Norwegian
study has demonstrated that improved nutrition resulted in
a 50-percent decrease in still births, premature births, and
infant mortality.

We urge private and public agencies to combine in estab-
lishing programs to prevent malnutrition and its effects. Mal-
nutrition can be prevented by providing the appropriate food
to expectant mothers and to children under three years old,
particularly those living in poverty.

130

If any food supplement program is to be successful, food
fads and habits must also be changed. Nutrition education is
a vital component in any program to prevent and correct
malnutrition.

It is not only the poor who are in need of nutrition educa-
tion. All groups in our society require information to im-
prove their nutritional health. Currently, we are giving a good
deal of attention to consumer education, including some nu-
tritional education. We urge that these efforts extend to en-
suring fair and honest advertising and labeling of the prod-
ucts we consume.

Environment and Heredity

We have all heard the term "deprived environment" used
to describe the handicaps of ghetto children; yet, relatively
little attention has been paid to determining the environmen-
tal needs of children. More consideration should be given to
the physical, intellectual, and emotional environments in
which we raise our children. Other groups and commissions
are reviewing many of these issues; our concern is that we
recognize the need for programs to provide parents with the
education, skills, and services to deal effectively with these
problems.

The relative importance of heredity and environment in
shaping an individual's growth and development remains un-
certain. Clearly, it is desirable to reduce the incidence of
genetically related disorders in the population. The frequency
of such disorders is much higher than formerly suspected. Ao
cording to experts:

No less than 25 percent of hospital and other institu-
tional beds are estimated to be occupied by patients
whose physical or mental illnesses or defects are under
full or at least partial genetic control.12

Others estimate that one out of 15 children is born with
some form of genetic defect, some so severe as to have tre-
mendous implications in the life of the affected person and
his family.13

The provision of genetic advice to parents and prospective
parents can increase the responsibility of their reproductive
decisions. With the information provided by genetic screen-
ing and counseling, a couple can approach parenthood with
some notion of the probability of their child having a genetic

131

disorder. We believe that this increased knowledge and aware-
N ness can benefit parents and children alike.

It would be unrealistic at the present time to imagine that
we can launch a full-scale program of genetic screening and
counseling. For centuries, man has observed that some dis-
orders are found with greater frequency in certain families,
and in some social and ethnic groups; it has only been in the
last half century that knowledge has accumulated concerning
the actual mechanism controlling inheritance. And there re-
mains a great deal to learn regarding the genetic components
of many disorders and the precise mode of their inheritance.
Furthermore, only recently have we become concerned with
the ethical and moral implications of the expanding tech-
nology of genetics.

As a Commission, we encourage increased support of: (1)
research to identify genetically related disorders; (2) develop-
ment of new and more refined screening techniques and re-
search aimed at improving the delivery of these services; (3)
extension and improvement of the care and treatment of per-
sons suffering from genetically related disorders; and (4) ex-
ploration of the ethical and moral implications of genetic
technology.

Although the science of genetics is still in its early develop-
ment, our knowledge and technology are sufficient to begin
to develop the educational, screening, and counseling pro-
grams to identify and inform couples at risk.

Private and public funds should be made available to de-
velop facilities and train personnel to implement programs in
genetic screening and counseling. A small number of such
programs are already functioning within groups in the popu-
lation known to experience a high frequency of certain dis-
orders. For example, bio-chemical evaluation of the fetus is
now used to detect the presence of Tay-Sachs disease among
members of the Jewish community, and prenatal chromo-
some analysis can detect Down's syndrome (monogolism),
which occurs with a high frequency in older pregnant women.
A simple blood test is now available to screen for sickle cell
anemia, which affects tens of thousands of black Americans,
and to identify those individuals who are carriers of the sickle
cell trait.

The Commission believes that genetic education is an im-
portant component in any program of education for parent-
hood. Therefore, we suggest that genetic information be part
of the health education services offered in comprehensive pro-
grams where patient counseling is involved, such as family
planning services, premarital counseling, prenatal clinics, and

132

maternal and child health projects. Moreover, we suggest
that material on genetically related diseases be included in the
school curriculum. Professional education should be expanded
to alert doctors, nurses, and other health workers to recog-
nize genetically related problems and to refer them to avail-
able genetic counseling services.

In the United States at present, the one role which most
people ultimately assume — parenthood — is given little atten-
tion. The Commission urges that parents and prospective par-
ents have access to the information, techniques, and services
needed to raise their children to be healthy, creative individ-
uals who are capable of full participation in our society.

SEX EDUCATION"

In our society today, many young people appear to be
questioning traditional sexual codes and experimenting with
new life styles and new moralities. Although there are many
manifestations of change, it may be that the fundamental
change consists of a greater willingness to submit our sexual
attitudes and behavior to public discussion. Traditional and
religious constraints on such discussion have receded; psychi-
atric writing has induced us to accept sexuality as a basic
aspect of personality development and interpersonal relation-
ships.

For some, the subject of human sexuality refers to the
physiological and emotional responses to sexual stimuli; re-
cent research into the biology of human sexuality reflects this
perspective. For others, sexuality consists of learning the
guidelines for appropriate sexual behavior. In its broadest
sense, sexuality is no less than the fact of being a man or a
woman, and how this identity affects personality and human
relationships.

Whatever the limits of the subject, there seems to be a lag
between the recognition of the importance of sexuality in hu-
man relationships and the development of ways to improve
this aspect of our lives. One reason for this is the insecurity
felt by most people in dealing with human sexuality. The chal-
lenge is great and there are few acknowledged experts to guide
us. When so basic a system of attitudes and behavior appears
to be changing and when there is conflict between traditional
sexual mores and contemporary sexual behavior, the task is to
educate and inform in this climate of uncertainty.

133

As a nation, we are reaching a consensus on the need for
sex education; and there is widespread support for these pro-
grams from the general public. A number of states have passed
legislation in support of sex education in public schools. Some
local school districts have instituted programs in family life
and sex education. Many responsible organizations have in-
dicated their support for sex education programs. In 1969,
the president of the National Congress of Parents and Teach-
ers stated that "sound education about sexuality is basic if
children are to understand human development, cope with
stresses and pressures of adolescence in modern America and
become adults capable of successful marriage and responsible
adulthood."15 The Interfaith Statement on Sex Education,
urges "all (parents, clergy and school) to take a more active
role, each in his own area of responsibility and competence* ,
in promoting sound leadership and programs in sex edu-
cation."16

There is a wide range of opinion on the subject of sex edu-
cation among specialists who are themselves divided on the
definition and content of sex education programs. To some
degree, the social and cultural backgrounds of the groups with
whom the sex educator is most familiar, and his perception
of their immediate needs, are reflected in his definition of
sex education. The sex educator working in an urban ghetto
will have views on the methodology and presentation of sex
education which might differ from those of an educator work-
ing in a middle-class suburban community. Furthermore, there
is a dearth of carefully constructed programs with clearly
stated assumptions, values, aims, and mechanisms for evalua-
tion.

Some authorities define the subject from a relatively narrow,
pragmatic perspective. They are of the opinion that young
people reject the authority of the school as representing "the
establishment," thereby making it difficult, if not impossible,
for schools to be an effective force in discussing the sensitive
relationships involved in human sexuality. These educators feel
that students should be taught what they want to know — that
is, the specific facts about reproduction, contraception, abor-
tion, and venereal disease. Moreover, students want the oppor-
tunity to discuss in the classroom their attitudes toward sexual
behavior. This subject matter should be presented in a straight-
forward manner in existing biology and health courses. And,
these school programs should be combined with community
efforts sponsored by youth-oriented groups, Planned Parent-
hood centers, and similar groups.

Others view sex education as a form of preventive medicine*

134

as an "appreciation of maleness and femaleness in relationship
with the same and opposite sex — part of the total personality
and health entity of each individual — character education.'*
From this perspective, sex education is not reproduction edu-
cation or simply the presentation of facts; it is seen as a way
of helping people, especially the young, to understand them-
selves and their sexuality in relation to the human community.

Although no single definition of sex education is accepted
by all those working in this field, we find more agreement on
the general objectives of sex education programs.

A major goal of sex education is to improve human relation-
ships by helping individuals deal more openly and reasonably
with their sexual concerns. In addition, sex education programs
aim to increase the individual knowledge and appreciation of
human sexuality.

Programs in sex education have the responsiblity to present,
in an appropriate manner, factual information on the emo-
tional, physical, and social aspects of sexuality.

Another goal of sex education is to enhance communication
between the generations regarding sexual attitudes and be-
havior. Most would agree that the home should be the source
of sound sex education. In fact, informal education about
sexuality is constantly provided in the home environment as
children are influenced by parental attitudes and behavior. A
recent survey conducted for the Commission on Obscenity
and Pornography indicates that an overwhelming number of
those interviewed reported parents as the preferred source of
sex education. However, mothers were an actual source of sex
information for 46 percent of the women, and parents served
as an actual source for only 25 percent of the men.17 Unfortu-
nately, large numbers of parents feel factually and emotionally
ill-prepared to handle the topic with their own children. Most
adults have had no formal sex education, and the characteristic
lack of communication about sexuality is a source of great
frustration and anxiety for parents and children alike. The
community can assist in this difficult task by providing sex
education for citizens of all ages; sex is a vital aspect of life for
people in every age group, and education in sexuality should
be an ongoing process.

The Commission recognizes that there is no best way to
define or conduct sex education programs, and that local com-
munities and groups must create programs which coincide with
their values, resources, and needs.

Today there is an increasing openness and public presenta-
tion of sexual matters. Some take advantage of this situation,
presenting sex in a sensational manner. Not enough informa-

135

tion about sexuality is presented to the public by responsible
sources. For example, we see no justification for a situation
where newspapers accept advertisements for X-rated movies,
while advertisements for birth control methods are unaccep-
table.

With an appreciation of the difficulties involved, we feel it
is possible to present material from this intensely personal
aspect of life in an open and forthright manner, while main-
taining respect for the intimate and private nature of the
subject. We believe this can best be done through responsible
programs of sex education.

Yet there remains a well-organized and vocal minority
actively opposing programs of sex education. Some of these
groups go so far as to interpret sex education as a politically
inspired plot to teach young people how to engage in sexual
activity, thereby officially condoning "immorality" and "per-
version." We regret that these groups have successfully fore-
stalled sex education programs in 13 states.18 We call upon all
groups to join in the creation of appropriate, high quality pro-
grams in sex education. The issue was underscored by the
observation of a high-school girl at one of the Commission's
public hearings: ". . . the refusal to provide education will
not prevent sex, but it certainly will prevent responsible sex."19

Ignorance does not serve to prevent sexual activity, but
rather promotes the undesirable consequences of sexual be-
havior— unwanted pregnancy, unwanted maternity, and ve-
nereal disease. These problems seem particularly acute for the
adolescent segment of our population. Unfortunately, society
has been slow to face the fact that, with or without formal sex
education, there is a considerable amount of sexual activity
among unmarried young people. A recent national study of
unmarried teenage girls revealed that 14 percent of 15-year-
olds and up to 44 percent of 19-year-olds reported having had
sexual relations. Only 20 percent of these girls used contracep-
tion regularly. Such a low incidence of contraceptive use is
particularly significant when less than half of these girls knew
when during the monthly cycle a girl can become pregnant.20
Rates of out-of-wedlock births to young women ages 15 to 19
increased by two to threefold between 1940 and 1968.21 (Dis-
cussions of teenage pregnancy and contraceptive information
and services for teenagers are found in Chapter 11.)

Venereal disease in the United States is considered by
public health officials an epidemic of unusual extent and sever-
ity. They estimate that 2.3 million cases of infectious venereal
disease were treated in the United States last year. The inci-

136

dence of reported venereal disease is highest among persons
under 25.22

After a consideration of alternative mechanisms for im-
proving and increasing programs of sex education throughout
the nation, the Commission suggests that funds be made avail-
able to the National Institute of Mental Health to support the
development of a variety of model programs in human sexu-
ality. These programs should include school- and community-
based projects in a number of different communities. In the
area of sex education there are few carefully designed pro-
grams were clearly defined goals and mechanisms for evalua-
tion. The evaluation and testing of different model projects
would greatly enhance the field of sex education.

We believe that sex education ideally should be focused in
the home and supplemented by schools and other community
groups including religious, medical, and service organizations.

To handle this material successfully, those people involved
should be individuals who themselves experience no difficulty
in being open and direct about sexual matters, and who have
the sensitivity and perception to gain the trust of youth. Few
of today's teacher training institutions provide adequate educa-
tion in this field. From a sample of 100 teacher training
schools, it was discovered that only 13 percent provide any
kind of specific training for teachers of sex education.

The Commission supports those community agencies and
educational institutions training professional sex educators, and
urges more schools to include such training in their programs.
Moreover, we encourage institutions involved in training pro-
fessionals in the health and welfare fields, such as doctors,
clergy, family-planning workers, and social workers, to add
courses in human sexuality to their curriculum.

Recognizing the importance of human sexuality, the Com-
mission recommends that sex education be available to all,
and that it be presented in a responsible manner through
community organizations, the media, and especially the
schools.

137

CHAPTER 10. THE STATUS OF

CHILDREN AND WOMEN

THE CHILDREN

There is no paradox in welcoming the trend toward smaller
families and simultaneously viewing children as our most valu-
able resource. In the past, we have not given children as high
a place in our priorities as in our rhetoric. With a renewed
trend toward fewer children per family, now is a propitious
time to begin.

The total needs of children within our society are addressed
in detail in the report of the 1970 White House Conference on
Children. There are, however, several issues of special rele-
vance to our task. Among these are child health and develop-
ment, welfare of pregnant adolescents, rights of children born
out of wedlock, and adoption.

Health and Development

We know that the physical, emotional, and intellectual
potential of each human being is greatly affected by the health
and nutrition of the expectant mother and by the care given
to the child in the first few years of life. However, adequate
prenatal care is not available to many women, especially the
poor who live in inner-city ghettos and in rural areas, pregnant
adolescents, and women pregnant out of wedlock. One result
is higher rates of death or illness among such mothers and

139

infants. Our nation's infant mortality rate is higher than that
of 12 other nations, and it varies within the United States
according to location and socioeconomic group. Infant mortal-
ity is higher among nonwhites and the poor than among whites
and the middle class. The incidence of cerebral palsy and other
birth disorders is also higher among the same groups.

Regular health care during the first year of life is a key to
preventing or correcting illnesses that may handicap for life;
but pediatric services are not sufficiently available to the poor.
In addition, very few private health insurance programs pay
for well-baby care, and even nonpoor parents may have diffi-
culty in meeting these costs.

Since 1935, the federal government has supported programs
to extend and improve health services for mothers and chil-
dren, especially in rural areas. One of these, the Maternal and
Child Health Care program of the Department of Health,
Education and Welfare, provided maternity nursing services to
over a half million women in the year beginning July 1, 1970.
Almost 1.5 million children received preventive health services
that included attention to their nutritional and other special
needs. Another, the Maternity and Infant Care program, was
established in 1963 to help reduce the incidence of mental
retardation and other handicapping conditions caused by com-
plications associated with childbearing, and to help reduce
infant and maternal mortality by providing health care to high-
risk mothers and their infants. As of July 1971, 56 maternity-
and infant-care projects admitted 141,000 new maternity
patients and over 47,000 infants.1

Federal support of these programs is not increasing signifi-
cantly; and they are unable, as presently constituted, to meet
the needs of all low-income women who are not receiving
private health care. Moreover, neither program is designed to
defray the costs of maternal and infant care for the nonpoor.

The Commission believes that our nation should set a goal
of providing comprehensive health care to all mothers and
children. This should be a high priority of our health-care sys-
tem. The costs and methods of developing a complete fertility-
related health program are discussed later. Two-thirds of the
costs of such a program would be for maternal and infant
care.2 The costs to the nation, over and above current expen-
ditures, are not excessive. The savings, in terms of improved
maternal and infant health, would be considerable. Until the
time that it becomes fully operational, existing federal maternal
and infant care programs, especially those carried out under
the authority of Title V of the Social Security Act, should be
extended and enlarged.

140

Child Care

It is essential to recognize the critical significance of the first
three years of life for the emotional and intellectual, as well as
the physical, development of children.* Information and edu-
cation on the importance of early cognitive development
should be made available to parents. In both the home and in
child-care programs, every effort should be made to provide
the best possible health, nutritional, emotional, and educational
support during this vital period.

Many parents today are looking for assistance in the care
and rearing of their children. There are various reasons for
this, including the steadily growing employment of women,
the declining reliance on relatives, and the increasing realiza-
tion of the learning potential of pre-school children.

In 1970, almost 2.6 million children under 18 had mothers
who worked at least part time; over 5.8 million of these chil-
dren were under age six.3 Large numbers of these working
mothers were the sole support of their families or supple-
mented incomes near the poverty level. Many middle-class
women are also entering the work force. Changing values, the
rising number of divorces, and the increasing costs of children
in an urban environment are some of the factors contributing
to this new trend.

The child-care arrangements made by working mothers,
especially those whose ability to pay is limited, are frequently
inadequate. Many children are cared for in their homes by
adult relatives or babysitters, but many are cared for by sisters
or brothers who are themselves children. Other children receive
care outside of the home under various arrangements. Only a
small percentage are enrolled in nursery schools or day-care
centers, and many of these are of low quality. At least one
million young Americans receive no supervision at all — these
are the so-called "latch-key" children who wander about after
school or remain at home alone when ill.4 These conditions are
unacceptable.

In other societies and in earlier times in our own country,
very young children were exposed to a variety of adults and
other children. In the so-called extended family, care was often
provided by grandparents, aunts, and cousins. In larger fam-
ilies and before universal education, many children depended

* A separate statement by Commissioner John N. Erlenborn appears
on page 276.

141

upon other siblings for much of their care. Today, greater
mobility, smaller families, and suburban housing patterns have
tended to isolate mother and child alone in the home for ex-
tended periods of time. As with employment, these trends
appear to be increasing. Many families would benefit from
versatile part-day as well as full-day child-care programs, or
from programs that could provide day and night care in case
of a family emergency.

Research has indicated the high learning potential of pre-
school children, and many people are beginning to urge that
some exposure to formal learning begin before age six. Some
have suggested that child-care programs become extensions of
the educational system. As the birthrate falls, school systems
may find that the desire for earlier entry into the educational
system will coincide with available classroom space. However,
the needs of a child-care system are such that substantial
changes would be required in the present operation of the
public school system.

Some of the opposition to the creation of a child-care system
in this country is based on the following beliefs: it may be de-
structive of the family; we cannot afford to undertake some-
thing as expensive as good developmental child care; and by
reducing the tension between motherhood and other roles,
child care will encourage the birth of more children.

We believe that institutional child care, if undertaken on a
broad basis, may have some beneficial implications for the
family. Economic and educational functions have been sepa-
rated from the family without destroying it. A "latch-key" child
will probably benefit from anything that gets him off the street
The child from a more traditional home may benefit from the
companionship of other children. It is unlikely that any child
could benefit from a sterile, institutional setting that offers no
stimulation. The kind of care a child receives is more impor-
tant than where he receives it. A child may learn to love or
hate in his home, in a neighbor's home, or in a child-care cen-
ter. What is essential is that children receive love, warmth, con-
tinuity of care, and stimulation.

Aside from the quality of care, parents must be able to make
the decision whether or not to use child-care services and to
what extent. Any form of compulsory child care is unaccep-
table, including the requirement that mothers place young
children in these programs in order to comply with regulations
that exact training and employment as a condition for benefit-
ing from assistance programs.

Developmental child care seems preferable to custodial pro-
grams; and there is no question that such programs, on a large

142

scale, will involve enormous expense. One source estimates
that it would cost $20 billion per year in public funds to pay
for the best kind of full-time developmental program for the
18 million children from families with incomes under $7,000.6
There may be ways to obtain good care for less. Experimen-
tation with a variety of programs and personnel seems essen-
tial.

Those who are able to pay for child care should do so.
Recent amendments to federal tax law to permit working per-
sons with incomes under $18,000 to deduct up to $4,800 per
year in child-care costs should make it possible for many
middle-income families to pay for these services.6 Union and
industry programs that provide care for children of members
and employees should be expanded. Even so, public funds
will be necessary both to stimulate innovative programs and
research, and to subsidize services for lower-income families.

Many people concerned with population growth have ar-
gued against public subsidization of child-care programs be-
cause they believe such programs may encourage childbear-
ing. In the short run, child-care programs may reduce the
tension between motherhood and employment, and thus make
it possible for some working women to feel they can manage
the responsibilities of both employment and children. How-
ever, it is also possible that child-care programs will have a
negative impact on fertility. Parenthood is an almost uni-
versally desired status in our society and most couples want
at least one child. The availability of child care is not likely
to affect the behavior of the woman who perceives her role
as that of wife and mother; nor is it apt to effect the decision
to have a first child. After the first or second child, however,
the economic opportunities available outside of the home to
a woman who wishes to work may affect her desire to have
additional children. With child care available, women who
want to work will have the opportunity to enter or reenter
the labor force much sooner; and the rewards of employment
may compete effectively with the satisfactions of additional
children. On the other hand, if a woman is unable to seek
alternative roles outside the home, perhaps because of an
inability to make adequate child-care arrangements, she might
channel all her creative energies into her domestic role and
might be encouraged to have additional children.

In the long run, therefore, child-care programs may reduce
fertility. Faced with no prospects for child care, many women
have chosen to foresake career aspirations rather than forego
motherhood. If future young women perceive that they may
combine both roles, it is likely that more of them will under-

143

take the training and education necessary to pursue careers
outside of the home.

We believe that the demand for child-care services will
continue to grow. The challenge is to make certain that they
enhance the well-being of the child.

The Commission therefore recommends that both public
and private forces join together to assure that adequate child-
care services, including health, nutritional, and educational
components, are available to families who wish to make use
of them.

Because child-care programs represent a major innovo
tion in child-rearing in this country, we recommend that
continuing research and evaluation be undertaken to
determine the benefits and costs to children, parents,
and the public of alternative child-care arrangements.

Adolescent Pregnancy and Children Born
out of Wedlock

The problem of pregnant adolescents requires special atten-
tion by our society. In 1968, just over 600,000 infants, 17
percent of all births in that year, were born to women under
20 years old. Childbearing at any age is a momentous event
for a woman; but pregnant teenagers, especially those in the
early teens, often experience serious health and social diffi-
culties quite different from those of women over 20.7

Their babies have a higher incidence of prematurity and of
infant mortality. Girls who marry or have a first child at an
early age also tend to bear subsequent children at a rapid rate,
so that intervals between births are relatively short. A study
of one metropolitan area found that 60 percent of girls who
had a child before the age of 16 had another baby while still
of school age.8 Education and employment opportunities may
be seriously impaired. In other sections of this report, we
stress the necessity of minimizing adolescent pregnancy by
making contraceptive information and services available to
sexually active young women. When an adolescent does be-
come pregnant, however, she should not be stigmatized and
removed from society. In the past, pregnant girls almost al-
ways had to leave school as soon as their condition became
known. Today, more and more school systems are making
efforts to see that the pregnant adolescent does not suffer

144

from lack of educational opportunity. Recently the Commis-
sioner of the Office of Education stated:

Every girl in the United States has a right to and a need
for the education that will help her prepare herself for a
career, for family life, and for citizenship. To be married
or pregnant is not sufficient cause to deprive her of an
education and the opportunity to become a contributing
member of society. The U.S. Office of Education strongly
urges school systems to provide continuing education for
girls who become pregnant9

We support the Commissioner's view, and believe that so-
ciety will be well-served if all school systems would make
certain that pregnant adolescents have the opportunity to con-
tinue their education, and that they are aided in gaining access
to adequate health, nutritional, and counseling services.

Out-of-wedlock births among young people aged 15 to 19
are increasing in the United States. In 1965, there were
125,000 children bora to unwed teenage mothers; in 1968,
the figure rose to 160,000. By 1970, the figure is estimated
to have risen to 180,000. The proportion of out-of-wedlock
births among 15- to 19-year-olds rose from 15 percent in
1960 to 27 percent in 1968.10

Unwed mothers are less likely than married mothers to
have adequate prenatal care; and children born out of wed-
lock are more likely to be born prematurely and to die in the
first year after birth. Adequate provision of contraceptive in-
formation and services, regardless of age, marital status, or
number of children, is likely to reduce rates of out-of-wedlock
pregnancy.

Our concern is specifically for the child who is born out of
wedlock. This child is not only more likely to suffer from a
health problem; he is born into a society that traditionally
views him as socially, morally, and legally inferior. Under
English common law, the child of an unwed mother was the
child of no one and had no rights of inheritance. Unfortu-
nately, this tradition has been preserved in many jurisdictions.
In many states, children born out of wedlock do not have the
same rights to child support or inheritance as children born
to married women.11 In some instances, when a man has a
wife and children born in wedlock, there are legal limits on
the amount that a father may will to a child born out of
wedlock.

The purpose of this legal discrimination was to protect the
sanctity of the family and to discourage extramarital sex. That

145

goal has not been fully realized. Furthermore, the assumption
that eliminating distinctions between children born in and out
of wedlock will somehow undermine the family has itself
been undermined by the fact that there has been no apparent
increase in the rates of out-of-wedlock births and/or irregular
unions in those countries where discrimination against such
persons has been abolished.12 There is a trend within this
country to reduce discrimination against these children. Every
state now recognizes that a mother has a legal right to the
custody of a child born out of wedlock, and some states grant
equal custody rights to the father. In states permitting re-
covery for wrongful deaths, there is a trend toward consider-
ing children born out of wedlock the natural progeny of both
father and mother for purposes of collecting damages. The
1965 amendments to the Social Security Act13 made it pos-
sible for the child to collect social security and other federal
benefits on an equal basis with children born in wedlock. Such
cases include those where the father has contributed to the
support of the child or has been decreed by a court to be
the child's father. Other, more subtle forms of discrimination
are also slowly being eliminated. Several states prohibit any
statement on a birth certificate as to whether a child is born
in or out of wedlock, or as to the marital status of the mother.
There is no justifiable reason to discriminate between chil-
dren according to the circumstances of their birth. The word
"illegitimate" and the stigma attached to it have no place in
our society.*

The Commission recommends that all children, regardless
of the circumstances of their birth, be accorded fair and
equal status socially, morally, and legally.

The Commission urges research and study by the Ameri-
can Bar Association, the American Law Institute, and
other interested groups leading to revision of those laws
and practices which result in discrimination against out-
of-wedlock children. Our end objective should be to
accord fair and equal treatment to all children.

Adoption ,4

One consequence of unwanted childbearing, especially out-
of-wedlock births, has been an increase in the number of

* A separate statement by Commissioner John N. Erlenborn appears
on page 277.

146

children available for adoption. In 1969, there were 171,000
children adopted, roughly two-thirds of whom were born out
of wedlock. However, in the same year, nearly half a million
children lived in foster homes, group homes, or child welfare
institutions.

It has been asserted that increased adoption might lower the
birthrate. Had all the children in foster homes and institutions
been adopted, the total number of adoptions in 1969 would
have reached over half a million. If each of these children had
represented a birth averted, the total reduction in the birthrate
might conceivably have reached 18 percent. This would be a
one-time effect, however, because the large number represents
an accumulation of unadopted children over many years.

The potential annual reduction in the birthrate can be
derived from the number of children born and made available
for adoption each year. In 1968, there were 339,000 out-of-
wedlock births recorded.15 Had each of those children been
adopted by a family which otherwise would have borne a child
of its own, the birthrate would have dropped by 1 1 percent at
most. However, this is an extreme upper limit, because many
children are not adopted as substitutes for childbirth. Some are
adopted for humanitarian reasons; others are adopted by in-
fertile couples. Some out-of-wedlock children are retained by
their families; and there are administrative complexities and
racial attitudes which prevent other children from being
adopted. Thus, the demographic impact of adoption on the
birthrate in the United States is minimal.

The value of adoption, however, is not diminished by the
lack of demographic significance. It is a practice that holds
rewards for children, parents, and society. There appears to be
a substantial number of prospective parents interested in adopt-
ing children, including couples unable to bear children of their
own. Presumably others would become interested in adoption
if it became more widely publicized that constraints on adop-
tion were less stringent than frequently believed, and if public
subsidies were available to assist adopting parents. For exam-
ple, about a fifth of our states have recently enacted legislation
to make it possible for a public agency to grant subsidies to
adopting parents. In addition, there is probably an increasing
number who would be willing to adopt rather than bear all of
their children. More than half (56 percent) of the respondents
to the Commission's public opinion poll indicated that they
would consider adopting a child if they already had two chil-
dren and wanted a larger family.16 Thus, the symbolic value of
adoption as a mode of responsible parenthood may come to
outweigh its direct demographic impact.

147

At the present time, it is not possible to determine reliably
the potential number of children available for adoption, or the
total number of parents who would adopt children. In this
country, adoption placement is shared by public and private
agencies. Legislation governing adoption differs among states
and within states. There is, therefore, considerable variation in
adoption practice and procedure, as well as in the availability
of services for prospective adoptive parents and children. Due
to provisions, guarding the secrecy of legal proceedings and
changes in the child's birth certificate, little information about
adoption exists in the public domain. Nor is much known
about who assumes the responsibility for rearing children born
out of wedlock.

It is our impression that adoption might become a more
widespread practice with: (1) changes in legislation; (2)
changes in adoption services; and (3) improved education
about adoption opportunities.

The Commission recommends changes in attitudes and
practices to encourage adoption thereby benefiting children,
prospective parents, and society.

To implement this goal, the Commission recommends:

Further subsidization of families qualified to adopt, but
unable to assume the full financial cost of a child s care.

A review of current laws, practices, procedures, and
regulations which govern the adoptive process.

Such a review could be carried out by the Council of State
Governments, the American Law Institute, and the American
Bar Association, and should include study of the inadequacy
and comparability of laws, the rights of natural parents, the
rights of children, the options for foster care and other cus-
todial care as opposed to adoption, and eligibility requirements
for adoptive parents, including such criteria as age, race, mari-
tal status, religion, socioeconomic status, and labor-force status
of prospective mothers.

INSTITUTIONAL PRESSURES

Every human society has various ways of channeling repro-
ductive behavior, both formally through the legal system and

148

informally through social institutions and cultural norms. For
most of human history, such influences have been strongly pro-
natalist as societies sought to ensure survival in the face of high
mortality. Today, in the modern technological society, the
balance has shifted. But childbearing is so interwoven with
other aspects of social life, and affected by laws promulgated
for other purposes, that it is not easy to say what would consti-
tute genuine "neutrality" in this respect, or what would be
truly "voluntary." Just how close to "neutral" is the present
situation, in either the legal or the institutional sphere? Where
are the major pressures one way or the other?
A consultant to the Commission concluded:

. . . our society is already pervaded by time-honored
pronatalist constraints. . . . We cannot preserve a choice
that does not genuinely exist, and, by the same token, it
makes no sense to institute anti-natalist coercions while
continuing to support pronatalist ones.17

Institutionalized pronatalist pressures include: (1) the so-
cialization of the young into sex-typed roles, with the boys
pointed toward jobs and the girls toward home and mother-
hood; (2) discriminations against the working woman and,
even more, the working mother; and (3) restrictions on higher
education for women. Such pressures are so pervasive that they
are typically perceived as "natural," and not simply cultural
prescriptions. They are so powerful that even the current move-
ment for women's liberation has hardly questioned mother-
hood as one of the goals for the modern woman.

There is no denying the strength of these pressures in today's
society, or the psychic punishments employed in their enforce-
ment. However, there are some contrary social trends as well
— the limited economic value of children in an urbanized, in-
dustrialized society; the substantial liberation that has already
occurred in the status of women; the rise of universal educa-
tion; the increasing ethos of rationality and freedom of choice
in reproduction; the decrease in pressure from traditional reli-
gious doctrine and, in some cases, direct religious support for
more freedom of choice — in short, all of the still emerging
social changes associated with the transition from traditional
to modern society. Indeed, it is largely this counterbalancing
that has resulted in the historical decline of birthrates in the
developed countries, as compared with the high birthrates in
developing countries where the pronatalist pressures are
stronger still.

Similar tendencies, in both directions, are also present in the

149

legal structure and public policy of the United States. Govern-
mental actions that can effect childbearing decisions by indi-
vidual couples include the laws regulating marital status (age
at marriage, divorce, responsibility for child care, status of
children born out of wedlock, even homosexuality); laws di-
rectly regulating fertility control (contraception and abortion);
tax policy on income, property, and inheritance; housing regu-
lations and subsidies, urban renewal programs, and welfare
policies; food subsidies; health programs; aid to families with
dependent children; fiscal support of formal schooling; alloca-
tion of expenditures to "male" or "female" sectors of the
economy; even the draft laws. Although our knowledge of
these influences is uncertain, three points should probably be
made: (1) rarely are such laws adopted on demographic
grounds; governmental influence is unintended, the by-product
of policies adopted for other reasons; (2) the influence is
mixed some pronatalist, some anti-natalist — and not easily bal-
anced; and (3) accordingly, their influence is not likely to be
great

Thus, the informal, institutional pressures would appear to
be much stronger than the formal, legal ones. They are prob-
ably also more difficult to change, at least over the short run.
The objective for American society should be to make the
childbearing decision as free of possible of unintended societal
pressures: It should not be to "force" people to become parents
in order to seem "normal," but to recognize that some people,
and perhaps many, are not really suited to parenthood. We
should strive for the ideal of diversity in which it would be
equally honorable to marry or not, to be childless or not, to
have one child or two or, for that matter, more. Our goal is one
of less regimentation of reproductive behavior, not more.

Women: Alternatives to Childbearing

Historical Change

Societies have varied widely in their family arrangements
and ideal roles for men and women, but the desire for progeny
has characterized both agricultural and industrial societies.*
Until modern times, high rates of reproduction were necessary

* A separate statement by Commissioner John N. Erlenborn appears
on pages 278-280.

150

to offset high mortality — especially high among infants and
children. In agricultural societies, children had an economic
value. More hands were an asset in a home-centered economy.
Also, before care of the aged became institutionalized, parents
had to rely upon their children for care in their old age; and
large numbers of children were advantageous. As a result of
these factors and of shorter life expectancy, women spent
most of their adult lives bearing and rearing the four or five
children traditionally expected.

In an earlier time, when economic functions were centered
in the home, both men and women shared child-rearing and
economic roles. When the industrial revolution shifted eco-
nomic activities into the marketplace, women were required
by the necessities of child-rearing to remain behind in the
home. Over the years, this division of labor between the sexes
became well-established, and has perhaps reached a new high
in parts of this country where the mother tends the children
in the suburbs, while the father commutes long distances to
work and has only a few hours each day to spend with the
family.

Long before the tradition of the large family disappeared,
some couples had begun to adopt the small family pattern
as individually desirable. With declining mortality rates,
diminishing economic value of children, increasing costs of
raising a child in an industrialized urban society, and im-
proved methods of fertility control, both the number of chil-
dren desired and born declined. Today, women marry earlier,
have smaller families earlier, and live longer than they did
50 years ago.

One result of reduced fertility and increased longevity has
been that, although virtually all American women marry and
bear children, they spend less and less of their lives in ma-
ternal functions. Most women have completed their child-
bearing by age 30; and typically, by their mid-30's, the last
child is in school. By age 50, the chances are that all chil-
dren have left home. And the average woman who reaches
50 today can look forward to 28 more years of life after her
maternal activities have ceased. Women of all ages have con-
tributed invaluable services to their communities through vol-
unteer activities. At the same time, more and more women
are beginning to work, to seek higher education, and to choose
roles supplementary to or in place of motherhood. We have
not yet fully accommodated these changes in our social, legal,
and economic structures.

If we should achieve a stationary population, women will
spend even less of their lives in bearing and rearing children

151

since family size, on the average, will be smaller. More
women may forego motherhood altogether.

For all of these reasons, it would seem good social policy
to recognize and to facilitate the trend toward smaller fam-
ilies by making it possible for women to choose attractive roles
in place of or supplementary to motherhood.

Alternative Roles

Although we believe that increasing the freedom of women
to seek alternative roles may reduce fertility, this change is
not sought on demographic grounds alone. The limitations on
the rights and roles of women abridge basic human liberties
that should be guaranteed to all, regardless of the future
course of population growth.

Here, as in the control of reproduction, our goal is to in-
crease freedom of choice. Just as we oppose coercion in the
control of fertility, we oppose any effort — explicitly or im-
plicitly— to penalize childbearing and parenthood. We reject
the notion that either motherhood or childlessness is or should
be made to seem unfashionable. Instead, we seek a greater
range of choice. Women should be able to choose mother-
hood, work, or other interests. Both men and women should
be free to develop as individuals rather than being molded
to fit some sexual stereotype.

Maximizing choice will require changes in the way men
and women are educated, as well as in certain legal and eco-
nomic practices. We have come to view certain roles, jobs,
school courses, feelings, actions, and reactions as either male
or female, and this effectively limits choice.

Building self-images begins within the family. Girls should
learn to look upon the wife-mother role as but one among a
number of desirable roles. They should be helped to develop
a sense of responsibility and confidence; personal achieve-
ment and enterprise should become valued traits for them. At
the same time, boys should learn to relate to girls as true
equals.

Schools are among the most important institutional forces
at work in defining male and female roles. Women's horizons
are effectively limited in many instances by the courses girls
are encouraged to take or not take, and by implications that
it is less necessary for them to excel academically or to pursue
higher degrees. Textbooks that always show women in stereo-
typical domestic roles are probably effective image shapers.

It would be desirable to end sex differentiation in school

152

courses, to train guidance counselors to view students as in-
dividuals, to channel educational and vocational interests
without regard to sex, and to revise school books to show
men and women in attractive roles both outside and inside
the home.

There is, despite the number of working mothers, consid-
erable ambivalance in our society as to whether women with
children should be working outside the home. If the notion
is to receive greater social acceptability, some redefinition of
the family roles of men and women will be required. Under
such conditions, both husband and wife would share more
equally in both economic and domestic functions. Women
who now work outside the home, often receive little assistance
from their husbands in domestic functions. Greater partici-
pation of the husband in family matters would probably re-
duce home-job tensions for the wife. It would also provide
fathers more opportunity to participate in the rearing of their
children and give children the opportunity to know their
fathers better. Many young couples are striving to develop
this pattern of family life, but it is difficult to achieve within
the present American context. A reworking of family roles
would necessarily involve changes in institutional practices —
different sets of working hours and provision for some sort
of paternity leave, for instance. Certainly, more study of the
effects of changing family structures and roles is necessary.
Although it is no longer necessary for all men and all
women to marry and have children, virtually all American
men and women do. We realize that not everyone is suited
for marriage and child-bearing, but those who choose to re-
main single and childless are viewed with some suspicion in
our society. It would be particularly helpful if marriage, child-
bearing, and childrearing could come to be viewed as more
deliberate and serious commitments rather than as traditional,
almost compulsory behavior.

Employment

More and more women are entering the labor market; today
43 percent of all women are in the work force.18 Some
analysts conclude that employment for women has a depress-
ing effect on fertility. Census Bureau data and various studies
show that, in the United States, employed women have borne
fewer children than economically inactive women.19 It is
difficult, however, to determine the direction of cause and
effect in this relationship. Some women may limit family size

153

because they are working, but women with children frequent-
ly do not work because they must care for the children.

Given the kinds of jobs usually open to women and the
employment patterns of women, claims that employment has
reduced fertility should be made with caution. Most women
are in low-paying, low status jobs that are unlikely to compete
effectively with childbearing. Further, until very recently, most
women worked only until they had children, and returned
to work after the children left home. This pattern, of course,
contributed to the limitations on pay and promotion because
women were not in the labor force long enough to secure
seniority and higher pay.

There is no question that women have experienced and
continue to suffer discrimination in employment. Often, they
are paid less than men for the same work, and are barred
from certain job positions by protective laws. Generally, they
have less chance for advancement even when they remain
in the work force for extended periods of time. Minority
women have suffered the greatest deprivation in the labor
market. Black women are consistently among the lowest paid
of all workers and the most likely to live in poverty.20

Recent federal and state laws to combat sex discrimination
have had some beneficial effect. However, further action is
necessary. Women should have equal access to all areas of the
labor market, for several reasons. First, despite the generally
held opinion that women work only until marriage or for
"pin money," there are 12 million women in the labor force
who have children under 18.21 A 1965 Department of Labor
report states that about two-thirds of all working women gave
economic considerations as their reason for employment.22
In 1971, 44 percent of working women were the sole support
of a family.23 Many others worked to supplement the low
incomes of their husbands. These women must have an equal
opportunity to support themselves and others.

Second, we believe that attractive work may effectively
compete with childbearing and have the effect of lowering
fertility, especially higher-order births. Virtually all American
couples want at least one child, but there is some evidence that
rewarding employment may compete successfully with child-
bearing beyond the first child.

Third, even if the number of children desired does not
change very much in the future, more women are likely to
be entering the labor market. Many will be single and will
support themselves and others. Others will work to augment
family income. Whatever the reason for working, equity de-

154

mands that all participants in the labor force have equal op-
portunity to advance as far as their skills and desires permit

Education

Education is an important key to achievement in employ-
ment in this country. Part of the reason women are under-
represented in such fields as law, medicine, and engineering
is that they do not have equal access to the higher educational
experience required by those fields.

There is abundant evidence that higher educational attain-
ment is associated with smaller families in the United States.
The American college graduate tends to marry later and pro-
create later, and to have fewer children per family or to form
more childless families.

While sex differences among whites in the attainment of a
high-school education have been minimal over the past 50
years, men have had and continue to have a better chance
of achieving a college education. In 1970, 59 percent of col-
lege students were men. A woman's chances of going on to
advanced degrees are much smaller than a man's. In 1970, 60
percent of all master's degrees and 87 percent of all doctorates
were awarded to men. This inequity appears to stem both from
institutional discrimination and from traditional expectations
that women will spend their lives in the home and therefore
have less need for higher education.24

In 1970, some eight million Americans were enrolled in
vocational education programs.25 Women in these programs
have been enrolled in the traditionally female occupations of
health, business and office work, and home economics. In
many schools, women are not permitted to take courses tradi-
tionally viewed as male oriented — electrical or electronics
technology, drafting, data processing, and power machine
operation- — which usually pay more.

The Commission believes that, as attitudes toward and in-
dividual control of family size continue to change and more
women seek employment outside of the home, more women
will also seek technical training, college, and graduate edu-
cations. So that opportunities will be available on an equal
basis, institutional discrimination against women in education
should be abolished. Enactment of several of the recommenda-
tions contained in the Report of the President's Task Force
on Women's Rights and Responsibilities would go far toward
resolving institutional discrimination.26 Because sex is not in-
cluded in federal legislation which prohibits discrimination

155

in federally assisted programs, women have sought a variety
of means to gain entrance to the student bodies and teaching
staffs of universities. These methods have been only partially
successful in achieving integration of the sexes. Since virtually
all schools receive some federal aid, extending federal law
to include sex discrimination, while exempting presently exist-
ing one-sex schools, would go far toward increasing oppor-
tunities in a more orderly fashion.

Equal Rights

As we have learned in the struggle for equal rights for mi-
norities, an end to legal descrimination does not guarantee
equality.* However, equality cannot begin to exist until all
legal barriers have been abolished. Women in the United States
occupy a separate and unequal status under the law. Under
common law, women were afforded few rights, and our Con-
stitution was drafted on the assumption that women did not
exist as legal persons. The legal status of women has improved
in the past century with the adoption of the Nineteenth Amend-
ment, alteration of some common law rules, and passage of
some positive legislation. But equal rights and responsibilities
are still denied women in our legal system. We believe this
should be remedied. The right to be free from discrimination
based on race, color, or creed is written into our fundamental
document of government. We believe the right to be free from
discrimination based on sex should also be written into that
document

The Commission therefore recommends that the Congress
and the states approve the proposed Equal Rights Amend-
ment and that federal, state, and local governments under-
take positive programs to ensure freedom from discrimination
based on sex.

Tax Policy and Public Expenditures

The costs to parents of bearing and raising children were
discussed in an earlier chapter. Those costs, however, repre-
sent only a portion of the true costs of children. A research
paper prepared for the Commission reached the tentative con-

* A separate statement by Commissioner Howard D. Samuel appears
on page 311.

156

elusion that public funds — through tax benefits or expenditure
programs — subsidize an additional large portion of the costs
of shelter, health, education, and welfare, thereby benefiting
couples with children more than those without children. All
citizens, regardless of whether or not they have children, pay
for the public costs of children.27

None of the tax policies or expenditure programs which
benefit children was instituted with the expressed intention of
encouraging childbearing. They all resulted from other per-
ceived needs within our society. Despite the fact that none of
these programs was intended to be pronatalist, many believe
this has been the result. They maintain that social welfare pro-
grams which benefit children have the effect of encouraging
population growth.

An examination of the effects of these laws in that respect is
worthwhile. Some programs may be said to encourage growth
because they are supportive of physical well-being. For in-
stance, food and health programs have improved the chances
of successful outcome of pregnancy and have helped to reduce
infant mortality.

Other programs have both benefited some families with
children while burdening others — housing programs are an
excellent example. Middle- and upper-class families, with and
without children, are more likely to purchase homes and, there-
fore, have benefited from tax deductions on interest paid on
home mortgages. They have also benefited from such programs
as Federal Housing Authority and Veterans Administration
loan guarantees, Federal National Mortgage Association and
Government National Mortgage Association mortgage pur-
chase authority, and Farmers Home Administration subsidized
housing. On the other hand, some housing programs have had
the effect of burdening families with two or more children,
especially among the poor. The public housing program, often
described as pronatalist, has in fact rarely benefited the larger
family. Until adoption of the 1968 Housing Act, the emphasis
in public housing was on smaller units. In that year, one-third
of all families moving into projects were elderly. One-third
had one or two children, one-fifth had three or four, and only
one-tenth had over four. At the same time, through urban
renewal and clearance for public housing and federal highway
programs, the federal government destroyed more low-income
housing units than it constructed in the 1960's. It can be said
that the overall effect of federal housing programs has been
to benefit middle- and upper-class families with children, but
to make it more difficult for low-income families with children
to find suitable housing.

157

Some programs have obviously benefited families with chil-
dren, but there is no proof they have encouraged the birth of
additional children. For instance, tax exemptions for children
benefit parents; but the amount of the deduction is so small in
contrast to the cost of child-rearing, that it is difficult to imag-
ine that anyone would have additional children in order to
secure additional exemptions.

Public assistance programs, especially aid to families with
dependent children, are frequently cited as encouraging repro-
duction among the poor. This cannot be demonstrated except
insofar as assistance payments make it possible for these
families to be better fed and cared for, thereby strengthening
their reproductive capacities. For years, the argument has been
that, because assistance payments are based upon the number
of children in the family, welfare mothers have more children
in order to increase their monthly payment. Welfare payments
and standards vary widely. In November 1971, the average
payment per family in New Jersey was $250; in Mississippi, it
was $55. Neither is large enough to support a family of any
size well. In addition, most state standards of need are set in
such a manner that progressively less is paid for each child; and
20 states have set maximum payments for each family regard-
less of the number of children.28

Many people believe that welfare families are much larger
than families in general. They are, in fact, half a child larger on
the average. Between the years 1967 and 1969, when welfare
payments were increasing, the average family size of welfare
recipients was declining.29 In New York City where, according
to the pronatalist view, steadily increasing payments and pro-
gram utilization in the years 1959 to 1970 should have en-
couraged more births, the percentage of welfare mothers bear-
ing children each year dropped from 18.9 percent in 1959, to
11.3 percent in 1970.30

This brief review of programs that benefit and/or burden
reproduction indicates how scant our knowledge is of the de-
mographic effects of tax and expenditure programs. We feel
it would be valuable to undertake studies to provide more in-
formation in this area, and to determine at what point repro-
ductive behavior is measurably affected by these programs.

While we are unable to find evidence that present tax poli-
cies and public expenditures promote the birth of additional
children, it is conceivable that the reverse might be true. As
concern about overpopulation has grown, some individuals
and groups have proposed consideration of tax policies or other
programs that would penalize childbearing.31 Three types of
policies have been proposed. The first would require parents

158

to assume all or a greater portion of the costs of their children.
For instance, public education and health and welfare pro-
grams would either be abolished or substantially reduced, and
tax deductions for children eliminated or cut back. The second
type of policy would penalize or levy a fee for childbearing.
The third type of policy would provide direct financial rewards
for not having children, or in some cases, a bonus for under-
going sterilization. Since it is generally assumed that it is not
childbearing per se but excessive childbearing that is to be
avoided, all of these proposals have variants in which penalties
or rewards would go into effect for any child after a certain
number. For example, public education would be available for
the first two children but not the third child; a fee would be
levied for the third child or a reward paid for each year in
which a third child was not born.

Many problems arise in regard to these proposals. First,
disincentive programs that penalize childbearing, withdraw
public subsidies of children, or limit public benefits to a certain
number of children in each family, have the effect of penalizing
the child and his siblings. For instance, if public education were
limited to two children and a third child were born, the family
would have the option of not educating the third child or of
depriving the children of some benefits in order to support the
cost of private education for that third child. The penalty, of
course, falls most heavily upon the poor. To penalize children
in order to motivate their parents is not justifiable.

Second, the type of program that offers direct financial
rewards for limiting childbearing would almost certainly offer
greater inducement to the poor. A flat rate of perhaps $300
for not bearing children is more likely to affect the behavior
of the poor than of the middle class, since the $300 has a
relatively higher value to the poor. A graduated bonus, in-
creased according to income, might still be more likely to
affect the behavior of the poor, depending upon the increase,
since the subjective need for money is not the same at all
levels. The need for a bonus of $300 to pay for next month's
food and shelter is unlike the need for $3,000 to purchase a
new car. If, as some have proposed, a bonus is to be offered
for sterilization, the question of financial inducement becomes
even more difficult so long as the procedure is substantially
irreversible. Childbearing is very highly valued in our society,
and sterilization should never be undertaken without serious
prior thought and knowledge of the ramifications. Since a
poor person would be especially vulnerable to financial induce-
ments, important ethical and moral questions arise. Bonus
payments would serve to discourage childbearing only among

159

the relatively few who are poorest. Therefore, it would not
affect our overall growth substantially, and would weigh
unevenly upon decisions about childbearing in a manner we
find unacceptable.

Third, not only would these policies have more effect on
the poor, but actual proposals to carry them out have, almost
without exception, been directed specifically toward one group
— welfare recipients. Bills to penalize childbearing by welfare
mothers have been introduced in a number of states. Coercive
proposals in regard to welfare recipients have included man-
datory sterilization after a specific number of out-of-wedlock
births. Most of the proposals have been framed in terms of
"voluntary action": The woman may choose to practice birth
control or lose custody of her children; the woman may
choose to be sterilized or go to jail; the woman may choose
to be sterilized or lose her welfare benefits. In 1971, the last
proposal was approved by a committee of the Tennessee state
legislature. In Connecticut last year, the state legislature con-
sidered a proposal to pay a bonus of $300 to every welfare
mother who chose to be sterilized. This Commission has made
clear the value it places upon voluntary fertility control, in-
cluding sterilization. We wish to make equally clear our
opposition to any program that singles out any group and
attempts to control their reproduction as the price for re-
ceiving aid for their children, for maintaining custody of their
children, or for retaining their own freedom.

Clearly, no proposal to penalize childbearing or reward
nonchildbearing can be acceptable in a situation in which
fertility control is not completely reliable and large numbers
of unwanted births occur.

Finally, past attempts to accomplish specific nonrevenue
goals through taxation have often been unsuccessful or have
led to unexpected side effects that overshadowed the original
goal. Some have suggested that one conceivable way to end
the argument over the anti- or pronatalist effects of tax policies
would be to undertake a fundamental revision of the tax
system to eliminate all deductions, exemptions, and loopholes.
This would remove any possible special inducements to child-
bearing. It would also broaden the tax base and reduce the
rate of the tax levy.

Quite apart from the issue of using fiscal policy to affect
childbearing is the question of whether it is equitable to re-
quire taxpayers who do not have children to pay for the
programs that make it less expensive for others to have and
rear their children. Present tax policies and expenditure pro-
grams have the effect of distributing the costs of children

160

throughout the society and of redistributing income in a
manner that benefits parents over nonparents. If parents were
required to bear the costs of their children, governmental
expenditures and taxes would be lower. Or alternatively, non-
parents could be taxed at lower rates if the tax structure were
arranged so that the costs of programs benefiting children
fell only upon parents.

If parents and children are viewed as a single unit and
anything which benefits the child is viewed as a benefit to
the parent, then some inequity is unquestionably involved.
However, if the child is viewed separately from his or her
parents and raising the next generation is viewed as the
responsibility of society as a whole, the question of equity
in supporting children ceases to exist. All children require
some minimum amounts of food, shelter, protection, and
education; and the general good of society is served by in-
suring that they receive it. Nonparents certainly have an
interest in seeing that all children are inoculated and that
epidemics are avoided. Nonparents certainly benefit from
the scientific and cultural advances that result from the edu-
cation of young people. The only reason to alter present
policies which are supportive of children would be if an even
higher goal were to be served. We cannot foresee any goal
with a higher priority than insuring the welfare of future
generations. We believe the public support of children, at
least at the present level, is justifiable. In fact, some of the
Commission's proposals would have the effect of increasing
that support for reasons which we also believe are justifiable.

161

CHAPTER 11. HUMAN REPRODUCTION

Contemporary American couples are planning to have an
average of between two and three children. Given the fact
of youthful marriage, far-from-perfect means of fertility con-
trol, and varying motivation, many of these couples will have
children before they want them and a significant fraction will
ultimately exceed the number they want.

Recent research1 has disclosed a substantial incidence of
such unplanned pregnancies and unwanted births in the United
States. According to estimates developed in the 1970 National
Fertility Study conducted by the Office of Population Research
at Princeton University, 44 percent of all births to currently
married women during the five years between 1966 and 1970
were unplanned; 15 percent were reported by the parents as
having never been wanted. (See table on page 164.) Only
one percent of first births were never wanted, but nearly
two-thirds of all sixth or higher order births were so reported.
In theory, this incidence of unwanted births implies that 2.65
million births occurring in that five-year period would never
have occurred had the complete availability of perfect fertility
control permitted couples to realize their preferences. And
these estimates are all conservative.

Unwanted fertility is highest among those whose levels of
education and income are lowest. For example, in 1970,
women with no high-school education reported that 31 percent
of their births in the preceding five years were unwanted at
the time they were conceived; the figure for women college
graduates was seven percent. Mainly because of differences
in education and income — and a general exclusion from the

163

Unwanted Fertility in the United States, 1970*

Most Likely

Percent of

Theoretical

Race and

Number of

Births

Births per

Education

Births per

1966-70

Woman without

Woman

Unwanted

Unplannedb

Unwanted Births

All Women

8.0

2.7

College 4+

2.5

2.4

College 1-3

2.8

2.6

High School 4

2.8

2.6

High School 1-8

8.4

2.9

Less

8.9

3.0

White Women

2.9

2.6

College 4+

2.5

2.4

College 1-3

2.8

2.6

High School 4

2.8

2.6

High School 1-3

8.2

2.8

Less

3.5

2.9

Black Women

3.7

2.9

College 4+

2.3

2.2

College 1-3

2.6

2.3

High School 4

8.3

2.8

High School 1-3

4.2

8.2

Less

5.2

3.1

* Based on data from the 1970 National Fertility Study for currently married
women under 45 years of age.

b Unplanned births include unwanted births.

socioeconomic mainstream — unwanted fertility weighs most
heavily on certain minority groups in our population. We have
relevant data for blacks only, but this is probably true for
Mexican-Americans, Puerto Ricans, Indians, and others as
well.

For example, if blacks could have the number of children
they want and no more, their fertility and that of the majority
white population would be very similar. These figures about
our black population illustrate the inequality of access of our
minority populations to the various means of fertility control,
as well as to the education and income which is so closely con-
nected with that access.

Not all unwanted births become unwanted children. Many,
perhaps most, are eventually accepted and loved indistinguish-
ably from earlier births that were deliberately planned. But
many are not; and the costs to them, to their siblings and par-
ents, and to society at large are considerable, though not easy
to measure.

And the costs are not only financial. The social, health, and

164

psychological costs must be enormous. Despite the incidence
of unwanted fertility — an incidence which in terms of ordi-
nary public health criteria would qualify as of epidemic pro-
portion— there is little hard evidence on which to assess its
impact. There was one study in Sweden2 in which a sample of
children born to women whose applications for abortion were
denied, was compared over a 20-year period with a control
group of other children born at the same time in the same
hospital. They turned out to have been registered more often
with psychiatric services, engaged in more antisocial and crim-
inal behavior, and have been more dependent on public as-
sistance.

The psychological burdens carried by children who are lit-
erally rejected by their parents and given over to institutional
care cannot be measured easily. But they must be considerable,
and we do know that the costs to society of providing for the
care of abandoned infants are significant.

Most of the costs of unwanted fertility are not visible in the
dramatic instances of abandonment or child abuse, but rather
in the more prosaic problems of everyday family life. Family
budgets can be seriously strained by the unexpected and un-
wanted birth of a child. And those who can least afford such
additional burdens most often experience them. The incidence
of unwanted births is twice as great among couples whose
annual incomes fall below $4,000 as it is among those with
incomes of $10,000 and higher. Since most unwanted births
experienced by married couples occur late in the childbearing
years, the woman who had been waiting for her youngest child
to be in school before returning to work can find her plans
abruptly frustrated.

There are also health costs involved. As President Nixon
observed:

. . . involuntary childbearing often results in poor phys-
ical and emotional health for all members of the family.
It is one of the factors which contributes to our distress-
ingly high infant mortality, the unacceptable level of
malnutrition . . .3

These health problems result, in part, from the fact that
most unwanted births occur to women in the later years of
childbearing. And these are the ages at which there are con-
siderably greater risks to maternity. For example, although
maternal mortality has declined by 94 percent over the past
30 years to a rate of 24 maternal deaths per 100,000 live
births, the risks increase sharply at the older ages. Compared

165

with the rate at age 20 to 24 when the risk is lowest, the rate
is four times greater at ages 35 to 39, almost eight times
greater at ages 40 to 44, and nearly 20 times greater at older
ages.4

The risk to the infant's life is also associated with the
mother's age; the infant mortality rate runs almost one-third
higher among women 35 years of age and over, than among
women aged 20 to 24.5

Because of the strong association between maternal age and
the appearance of certain hereditary diseases, the prevention
of births to women over 35 would reduce the incidence of
such diseases. For example, the incidence of Down's syn-
drome, which accounts for 95 percent of mongolism, would
be reduced significantly by the avoidance of childbearing in
the older ages.

How far down the road toward population stabilization
would the prevention of unwanted births take us? Since fer-
tility has been changing so rapidly in recent years, such an
estimate is difficult to make. The record of women who are
approaching the end of their childbearing, those 35 to 44 years
old in 1970, indicates that 27 percent had at least one un-
wanted birth, a total of one in every six births. The prevention
of the unwanted births in this group would have carried them
about three-fifths of the way to the replacement level. But
women in those age groups were the main participants in the
post-war baby boom and have had the highest fertility of any
women in modern time. And there has been a signifiant change
downward in the family-size expectations of young couples.

We conclude that there are many "costs" associated with
unwanted fertility, not only financial, but health, social, psy-
chological, and demographic costs as well.

The Commission believes that all Americans, regardless of
age, marital status, or income, should be enabled to avoid un-
wanted births. Major efforts should be made to enlarge and
improve the opportunity for individuals to control their own
fertility, aiming toward the development of a basic ethical
principle that only wanted children are brought into the world.

In order to implement this policy, the Commission has for-
mulated the following recommendations that are developed
in detail in the remainder of this chapter:

The elimination of legal restrictions on access to contra-
ceptive information and services, and the development
by the states of affirmative legislation to permit minors to
receive such information and services.

166

The elimination of administrative restrictions on access
to voluntary contraceptive sterilization.

The liberalization of state abortion laws along the lines
of the New York State statute.

Greater investments in research and development of im-
proved methods of contraception.

Full support of all health services related to fertility,
programs to improve training for and delivery of these
services, an extension of government family planning
project grant programs, and the development of a pro-
gram of family planning education.

CONTRACEPTION AND THE LAW6

After almost a century of innumerable efforts on the part
of many individuals and agencies, Congress finally, on Jan-
uary 8, 1971, repealed the 1873 Comstock Act — a broad
gauge obscenity law which had prohibited in its omnibus
sweep the importation, transportation in interstate commerce,
and mailing of "any article whatever for the prevention of
conception." Thus, the anti-contraception law of the federal
government is now substantially limited to unsolicited con-
traceptives and unsolicited contraceptive advertising.

The states, too, have considerably modified their "little
Comstock laws," so that today contraception is legal for adults
in all states (with the possible exception of Massachusetts and
Wisconsin, which specify that the adults must be married).
However, more than half the states retain, in effect, statutes
which prohibit or restrict the sale, distribution, advertising,
and display of contraceptives.

Approximately 22 states prohibit the sale of all or some
contraceptives; but all states, either by statute or common
law, allow exceptions for doctors, pharmacists, or other li-
censed firms or individuals. Roughly 23 states prohibit com-
mercial advertising of contraceptives, but most of these states
make exceptions for medical and pharmaceutical journals.

The same 23 states also condemn the display of contracep-
tives and of information about them, but, with a few possible
exceptions, explicitly permit such display under certain cir-
cumstances. At least 27 states, either expressly or inferentially,

167

prohibit the sale of contraceptives through vending machines.

Literal interpretations of these anti-birth control laws are
often unreliable; their enforcement is uneven, and in some
instances, there are conflicting interpretations. In several
states, court decisions have modified or even nullified the
letter of the statute.

Some attacks on the statutes have been successful, but
court decisions are much less visible than statutes. Clearly,
the statutes themselves should be clarified or, better still,
repealed.

One way or another, these laws inhibit family planning
programs, and/or impinge on the ready availability of meth-
ods of contraception to the public. By prohibiting commercial
sales, advertising displays, and the use of vending machines
for nonprescription contraceptives, they sacrifice accessibility,
education, and individual rights in the interest of some unde-
fined purpose. Whatever the original justification for these
laws, their result is to prevent contraceptive information and
supplies from being easily obtainable in general and, in some
instances, make them unobtainable.

Merely removing such laws will not automatically ensure
freedom of access and choice. More is needed in the way of
affirmative programs to distribute such information and sup-
plies to all who may wish to use them. Nonetheless, it is
desirable and important that laws not operate as impediments.

The Commission thus recommends that: (1) states elimir
nate existing legal inhibitions and restrictions on access to
contraceptive information, procedures, and supplies; and (2)
states develop statutes affirming the desirability that all per-
sons have ready and practicable access to contraceptive
information, procedures, and supplies.

Legal Impediments for Minors

It seems clear that the law also plays a role in the inade-
quate access of teenagers to contraceptive information and
services.* The laws here are not so much the laws on contra-
ception, but the inchoate and never universally applicable
common law rule which has been considered to bar medical
treatment and examination of minors without parental con-
sent. Although it has been assumed that this was the rule at

* Separate statements by Commissioners Paul B. Comely, M.D.
(pp. 263-264), Alan Cranston (p. 269), and John N. Erlenbom (pp.
280-281) appear on the indicated pages.

168

common law, the fact is that there were always many excep-
tions recognized by the same common law, some of which
seem to sanction contraceptive services to teenagers — for
example, in emergencies or when the minor was married or
otherwise "emancipated." Recently, the courts, including the
United States Supreme Court, have held that minors are not
second class citizens and that they are entitled to constitu-
tional rights of many kinds. Arguably, one of these rights is
the right to decide whether or not to have a child.

In addition, some state courts have declared the existence
of a further exception to the common law rule which has
since become known as the "mature minor rule." In essence,
it provides that a minor may consent to medical treatment for
himself if he understands the nature of the treatment and it
is for his benefit.

Notwithstanding the fact that there appears to be no case
on record of a successful suit against a doctor or a health
agency for rendering any kind of medical service to a minor
over 15 without parental consent, the uncertainty and ambi-
guity in the general law governing medical services to minors
has inevitably restricted access to contraceptive services.
Many physicians are reluctant to prescribe contraceptives even
for sexually active minors who have been, or who clearly will
be, exposed to the risks of pregnancy. Despite the absence of
prosecutions and civil suits, physicians continue to fear that
action will be taken against them.

Faced with this reluctance on the part of the medical and
related professions, an ever-increasing number of states have
enacted new laws to permit minors to consent to medical
services in general, or in such areas as birth control, venereal
disease, and drugs. Nevertheless, it is clear that many of the
new statutes do not cover thousands of single minors — those
who are not yet parents, who want to postpone becoming
such, who are living with their families, who prefer to stay in
school, or who are not managing their own financial affairs.
Even some of those state laws which authorize family plan-
ning programs impose, specifically or in practice, such ineligi-
bility requirements as parenthood or marriage, 18 years of
age and married, or marriage or parental consent.

Medical and agency practices tend to be restrictive and
discriminatory against minors in the absence of a clear man-
date for full availability from the legislature. A number of
major United States medical organizations have made recom-
mendations approaching the recent statement of the Executive
Board of the American College of Obstetricians and Gyne-
cologists which declared:

169

The never married, never pregnant, sexually-involved
female has not yet been reached with effective contra-
ception. The laws of some states indirectly prohibit this
service to minors and thereby prevent the gynecologists
from serving them or place the physician in legal jeop-
ardy if he does so.7

The Board went on to state that "the unmarried female of
any age should have access to the most effective methods of
contraception," and urged that legal barriers which restrict
the physician's freedom should be removed "even in the case
of the unemancipated minor who refuses to involve her
parents."

Because of the serious social and health consequences in-
volved in teenage pregnancy and the high rates of teenage
out-of-wedlock pregnancy and venereal disease, the Commis-
sion urges the elimination of legal restrictions on access to
contraceptive and prophylactic information and sendees by
young people.

We recommend that states adopt affirmative legislation
which will permit minors to receive contraceptive and pro-
phylactic information and services in appropriate settings
sensitive to their needs and concerns.

To implement this policy, the Commission urges that
organizations, such as the Council on State Govern-
ments, the American Law Institute, and the American
Bar Association, formulate appropriate model statutes.

VOLUNTARY STERILIZATION8

Given the difficulties experienced by many women with
the pill and the intrauterine device, and the high failure rates
of many other methods of contraception currently used, an
increasing proportion of persons are turning to surgical ster-
ilization. According to die 1970 National Fertility Study,
sterilization has become a very popular method of preventing
conception. Almost three million wives under the age of 45,
or their husbands, had elected sterilization for contraceptive
reasons. This amounts to nearly one in every five couples
able to bear children who do not intend to have any more.

170

About half of such operations are elected by women and half
by men. Between 1966 and 1970, the typical case was a
woman of 32 or a man of 35 with an average of nearly four
children.

The average fecund woman, after the birth of her last
wanted child, has some 10 or 15 years of exposure to the risk
of an unwanted conception before the onset of menopause,
and current patterns of contraceptive use offer little confi-
dence. Elective sterilization — tubal ligation for females and
vasectomy for males — offers many couples secure protection
against involuntary pregnancy. The former requires a 15-
minute operation in which the fallopian tubes are tied off
and several days hospitalization; the vasectomy, typically per-
formed in a doctor's office in a few minutes, involves cutting
and tying the vas deferens tubes which carry the sperm, a
. procedure which, contrary to some misunderstanding, has no
significance for sexual behavior. A new procedure for women
— laproscopic/culdoscopic sterilization — has also been devel-
oped. This procedure requires no hospitalization. And re-
search on reversibility of male and female sterilization is
under way. New developments in the male procedure offer
the possibility of substantially increasing the probability of
reversal; and the existence of sperm banks greatly modifies
the major concern about possible changes of mind in the
future.

The legal situation with respect to voluntary sterilization is
quite different than with contraception or abortion. There is
no general federal law governing voluntary sterilization, and
the few existing state laws, by and large, present no insuper-
able problems. Rather, the lack of any specific law in many
states often leaves physicians in a climate of uncertainty
where many fear civil or criminal liability for performing
voluntary sterilizations, even though, under well-settled prin-
ciples of law, what is not prohibited is permitted.

Apart from the vagueness of the statutory situation, many
hospitals impose various requirements for voluntary steriliza-
tion which greatly cut down on its availability. Such require-
ments include limiting the procedure to persons of specified
age and number of children, or permitting only therapeutic
as opposed to contraceptive sterilizations.

In order to permit freedom of choice, the Commission
recommends that all administrative restrictions on access to
voluntary contraceptive sterilization be eliminated so that
the decision be made solely by vhysician and patient.

171

To implement this policy, we recommend that national
hospital and medical associations, and their state chap-
ters, promote the removal of existing restrictions.

ABORTION

The Law9

Prior to the second quarter of the 19th century, the law
applicable to abortion in the American colonies, and sub-
sequently in the expanding United States, was the Common
Law of England. Under that law, women were free to have
abortions at least until "quickening" — the first perception of
fetal movement by the pregnant woman, which usually occurs
between the 16th and 20th week.

In the second quarter of the 19th century, restrictive laws
were enacted in 12 states. The only known contemporary au-
thoritative texts explaining the reason for the enactment of
these prohibitions of abortion before "quickening" relate to
New York and New Jersey. Both point to the life and health
of the pregnant woman as the objective. Before the intro-
duction of ether anesthesia (1846) and antisepsis (1867),
any surgery was likely to cause death from shock or infection.
Actually, at the time New York State adopted such restrictive
laws in 1829, serious consideration was given to banning all
surgical operations except when necessary for the preservation
of life. Thus, in the drafting of such legislation, the concern
of the law-makers was medical rather than moral. It was in
the latter half of the century that the sensationalism of An-
thony Comstock inspired a moral fervor which resulted in
moral considerations becoming the dominant element in
highly stringent laws against abortion.

Currently, in over two-thirds of the states, abortion is a
crime except to preserve the life of the mother; 12 states
have changed their abortion statutes consistent with the Amer-
ican Law Institute Model Penal Code provision on abortion
which prohibits abortion except in cases where the mother's
life or her mental or physical health is in danger, or to prevent
the birth of defective offspring, or in cases of rape or incest.
In 1970, abortion laws in Alaska, Hawaii, and New York
were liberalized by law and in the state of Washington by

172

popular referendum. Currently, abortion is being reviewed
in the courts in over half of the states.

At its 1972 meeting, the House of Delegates of the Amer-
ican Bar Association approved a Uniform Abortion Act rec-
ommended by the Commissioners on Uniform State Laws
stating that abortion may be performed by a duly licensed
physician upon request.

The Moral Question10

The Commission recognizes that abortion is a complex
issue requiring a thoughtful balancing of moral, personal, and
social values. As the Commission moves toward a population
policy for the United States, our principal objective is the
enrichment of life, not its restriction. We share with our fellow
citizens an abiding concern for the sanctity of all human life.
Thus, we appreciate the moral decisions involved in abortion,
as well as the possible insensitivity to all human life implied
in the practice of abortion. It is from this perspective that
we have approached three moral issues concerning abortion
which we believe to be of foremost importance.

The first issue relates to the fetus, both as to the termina-
tion of potential life and determining when that life actually
begins. The second relates to bringing into the world an un-
wanted child, particularly when the child's prospects for a life
of dignity and self-fulfillment are limited. Third, there is the
question of the woman who in desperation seeks an abortion.
Our society faces a difficult decision when the woman believes
her well-being is threatened and she sees no other way out
but an illegal abortion with all its attendant dangers.

The Commission believes that a wise and sound decision
in regard to the abortion question requires a careful balancing
of the moral problems relating to the woman and the child
along with those concerning the fetus.

In the development of western culture, the tendency has
been toward a greater protection of life. At the same time,
there is a deep commitment in our moral tradition to indi-
vidual freedom and social justice. The Commission believes
that the various prohibitions against abortion throughout the
United States stand as obstacles to the exercise of individual
freedom: the freedom of women to make difficult moral
choices based on their personal values, the freedom of women
to control their own fertility, and finally, freedom from the
burdens of unwanted childbearing. Restrictive statutes also
violate social justice, for when abortion is prohibited, women

173

resort to illegal abortions to prevent unwanted births. Medi-
cally safe abortions have always been available to the wealthy,
to those who could afford the high costs of physicians and
trips abroad; but the poor woman has been forced to risk her
life and health with folk remedies and disreputable prac-
titioners.

Public Health"

Abortion is not new; it has been an alternative to an un-
wanted birth for large numbers of American women (estimates
ranged from 200,000 to 1,200,000 illegal abortions per year
in the United States). The Commission regards the issue of
illegal abortion with great concern and supports measures to
bring this medical procedure from the backrooms to the hos-
pitals and clinics of this country. It is becoming increasingly
clear that, where abortion is available on request, one result
is a reduction in the number of illegal abortions. Deaths as
a consequence of illegal abortion have dropped sharply in
New York since the enactment of a liberal abortion statute.
The number of women admitted to New York City hospitals
with incomplete abortions has also declined. The experience
in California is comparable; the number of maternal deaths
has decreased as the number of therapeutic abortions has in-
creased. Comparative data from Czechoslovakia, Hungary,
and Poland also indicate that, after liberalization of abortion
laws in the 1950's, hospital admissions for "other" abortions
declined.

A reduction in the number of illegal abortions has an im-
portant impact on maternal mortality. Maternal mortality
ratios (including the 12 deaths out of 278,122 abortions per-
formed under legal auspices) in New York City dropped by
two-thirds the year after abortion became available on request.
For 1971, New York City experienced the lowest ratio of
maternal deaths ever recorded. Judging from the experience
in other countries, there is reason to suspect that the maternal
death ratio will continue to decline. The most important
variables in mortality from abortion are the length of gesta-
tion and the technique involved. The greatest number of com-
plications occur after the 14th week of gestation. In New
York, abortions performed before 12 weeks have a complica-
tion rate of 4.6 per 1,000 abortions; for those after 12 weeks,
the rate is 26.8 per 1,000. The safety record will undoubtedly
improve as physicians and institutions gain more experience
with the procedure, and as the proportion of first trimester

174

abortions increases. The choice of the technique for perform-
ing an abortion is largely determined by the period of gesta-
tion. As the number of early abortions increase so will the
use of the safest known technique — suction curettage.

In his testimony before the Commission, Gordon Chase,
New York City Health Services Administrator, reviewed the
impact of abortion on request on infant mortality:

For example, infant mortality, which has been dropping
in the City, has apparently been further reduced by abor-
tion "on demand." This is because the procedure is now
broadly available to those women who are at greatest risk
of giving birth to infants who may die: namely, very
young women, unwed mothers, who generally get poorer
pre-natal care, and women who have had many previous
births and pregnancies, as well as women with medical
handicaps. For 1969, infant mortality was 24.4 per 1,000
live births; it was down to 21.6 for 1970; and down still
further to 20.7 in 1971, the first year in which the law
would have had an impact. Neo-natal mortality — deaths
occurring in the first 28 days of life — shows a more
striking decline: from 18.1 to 16.2 to 14.9 in the past
three years.12

What is the effect of abortion on out-of-wedlock births? The
best information comes from New York, where out-of-wedlock
births have been on the rise since they were first recorded in
1954. Statistics for the first eight monhs of 1971 indicate
that, for the first time, the rate is declining. Moreover, the
New York City programs for unmarried pregnant girls have
reported a sharp decline in the number of applicants this year.

In summary, we are impressed that the availability of
abortion on request causes a reduction in the number of
illegal abortions, maternal and infant deaths, and out-of-
wedlock births, thereby greatly improving the health of
women and children.

Family Planning

The Commission affirms that contraception is the method
of choice for preventing an unwanted birth. We believe that
abortion should not be considered a substitute for birth con-
trol, but rather as one element in a comprehensive system of
maternal and infant health care. For many, the very need
for abortion is evidence of a social and personal failure in the

175

provision and use of birth control. In the year beginning July
1, 1970, an estimated 505,000 legal abortions and an unknown
number of illegal abortions were performed in the United
States.13 Far too many Americans must resort to abortion to
prevent an unwanted birth. It is our belief that the responsible
use of birth control can be achieved only when sex counseling
and contraceptive information and services are easily accessi-
ble to all citizens.

The Commission expects that, with the increasing avail-
ability of contraceptives and improvements in contraceptive
technology, the need for abortion will diminish. It is encourag-
ing to learn that there has been a marked increase in recent
attendance in family planning programs in New York City.

The Demographic Context

In reviewing the abortion issue, one central concern has
been an evaluation of the demographic impact of abortion.
We appreciate the historic importance of placing recom-
mendations on abortion in a demographic context.

At the present time, it is difficult to make precise quantita-
tive statements concerning the demographic impact of abor-
tion. We are unable to estimate the effect on the birthrate of
an unknown number of illegal abortions. There is little doubt,
however, that legal and illegal abortions exert a downward
influence on the United States birthrate. Support for this
general conclusion is found in the preliminary data from New
York and the experiences of some other nations with liberal
abortion policies, notably Japan and the Eastern European
countries.14 However, caution must be exercised in general-
izing from the experience of other countries to the impact of
abortion on United States population growth. The United
States differs from these other nations socially, politically,
economically, and most importantly, in the level of contra-
ceptive practice.

Only limited data on the demographic consequences of
abortion are available from New York. Our best estimate of
the probable impact if the entire country were to follow the
New York law would be a decline of 1.5 per 1,000 in the
birthrate in the first year after restrictions were removed.15

Public Opinion

Public opinion on abortion is changing, tending recently
to grow more liberal. Some 14 to 20 percent more women

176

in 1970 than in 1965 approve of abortion for various reasons,
according to interview data collected in ihe 1965 and 1970
National Fertility Studies.16 The public opinion survey con-
ducted in 1971 for the Commission indicates that half of all
Americans believe that abortion should be a matter decided
solely between individuals and their physicians; an additional
41 percent would permit abonion under certain circumstances,
and six percent flaily oppose abortions under any circum-
stances. Estimates of the current state of attitudes on abortion
doubtless depend very much on the phrasing of the question
and the interpretation of the respondent.

In general, support for increasing ihe availability of legal
abortions is strongest among non-Caiholics and among those
who are well-educated. Among the general public, 38 percent
feel that the government should help make abortion available
to all women who want it.17

Recommendations

The abortion issue raises a great number of moral, legal,
public health, and demographic concerns. As a group, the
Commission has carefully considered these issues, and based
on their personal views, individual members of the Commis-
sion have resolved these questions differently.*

A few members of the Commission** are opposed to
abortion. These Commissioners consider abortion a remedial
measure, and choose to emphasize society's responsibility for
improving and enriching the lives of all citizens.

Some Commissioners*** approve of abortion only under
the specific conditions set forth in the American Law Institute
model abortion statute. These Commissioners believe that no
woman should be forced to bear a child, thereby endangering
her physical or mental health. Their concern is that abortion
be available only on a limited basis and that it be considered
as a last resort to protect life or health.

The majority of the Commission believes that women should
be free to determine their own fertility, that the matter of
abortion should be left to the conscience of the individual

* Separate statements by Commissioner Alan Cranston (pages 264-
265) and Commissioner John N. Erlenborn (pages 281-282) appears on
the indicated pages.

** Separate statements by Commissioners Paul B. Comely, M.D.
(pages 264-265) and Grace Olivarez (page 291) appear on the indicated
pages.

*** A separate statement by Commissioner Marilyn Brant Chandler
appears on pages 261-262.

177

concerned, in consultation with her physician, and that states
should be encouraged to enact affirmative statutes creating a
clear and positive framework for the practice of abortion on
request.

Therefore, with the admonition that abortion not be con-
side) ed a primai y means of futility control, the Commission
recommends that present state laws restricting abortion be
liberalized along the lines of the New York State statute,
such abortions to be performed on request by duly licensed
physicians under conditions of medical safety.

In carrying out this policy, the Commission recommends:

That federal, state, and local governments make funds
available to support abortion services in states with
liberalized statutes.

That abortion be specifically included in comprehensive
health insurance benefits, both public and private.

METHODS OF FERTILITY CONTROL

Although current knowledge, if applied systematically, could
bring about considerable progress toward reducing unwanted
fertility, the successful control of reproduction depends greatiy
on the availability of efficient methods for regulation of
fertility.*

The development of the pill and the intrauterine device
represent major innovations in contraceptive technology, but
they are far from perfect solutions to the problem of control
of reproduction. We must have contraceptives and other
methods of fertility control that are safe and free of any
adverse reactions; effective, acceptable, coitus independent,
and accessible commercially rather than medically; and inex-
pensive, easy to use, and reversible. This goal will be reached
only if research efforts equal the magnitude of the task.

Currently, some new approaches to fertility control are in
experimental trial; other possibilities are under laboratory in-
vestigation.18 The list of potentialities includes daily pills for

* Separate statements by Commissioners John N. Erlenborn (page
283) and George D. Woods (page 312) appear on the indicated pages.

178

women that would be safer than those now available; weekly
or monthly pills for men or women; a small plastic implant
to be placed under the skin of men or women that could last
for years; sophisticated devices or procedures that would make
voluntary sterilization of either men or women safer, simpler,
and more reversible; modern forms of intrauterine or intra-
vaginal devices that women could use safely in a variety of
ways depending on their own preferences; natural substances
that could regularize menstrual cycles and improve the rhythm
method; and natural substances for post-coital use which
interfere with the development of pregnancy. Thus, prospects
exist for developing new methods of fertility control which
could have advantages over those currently available. How-
ever, none of these contain all of the elements of the "per-
fect" contraceptive.

Until a dozen years ago, all major methods of contraception
were based on the simple principle of preventing the sperm and
egg from meeting in the fallopian tube, where fertilization
occurs. The rhythm method of contraception was the first
attempt at fertility control based on the understanding of the
endocrinological aspects of the ovarian cycle and the limited
duration of &gg survival. The pill and the intrauterine device
further exploited this knowledge and represented significant
breakthroughs in a field which has been largely neglected by
science for most of human history. However, in terms of the
potential technology which should be feasible as a result of
today's sophisticated scientific capabilities, the contraceptive
methods currently available are fairly primitive.

Other methods of fertility control are far from perfect. Vol-
untary sterilization is increasing in popularity; and new pro-
cedures are being tried, but progress is slow. There is wide-
spread resort to abortion in the United States and throughout
the world. In the last decade, new techniques have emerged
which are simpler and less traumatic; but they are expensive
and need further refinement.

Methods of fertility regulation remain limited because our
knowledge of basic reproductive biology is inadequate. We do
not fully understand what governs ovulation, how long an
ovum can survive, what governs sperm production, how long
sperm survive, what governs a menstrual cycle, or how long
it lasts. Such knowledge is essential for the practice of "rhythm"
as well as for effective chemical or mechanical contraception.
Unwanted and accidental pregnancies are only one conse-
quence of our ignorance. Many couples avoid pregnancy only
through use of methods that are cumbersome and produce a
great deal of anxiety. Others who desperately want children

179

cannot conceive. A large number of married couples suffer
from problems of infertility; the ability to help them is sorely
limited by the same lack of information concerning basic re-
productive processes that inhibits effective contraception.

This knowledge is essential, not just for regulating fertility,
but also for improving the outcome of pregnancy. Today, many
mothers suffer the risk of serious injury, ill health or even
death in pregnancy and childbirth. Too many children are
born with physical and mental handicaps. We spend billions
in therapy, remedial treatment, custodial care, and repair of
damage that might have been prevented by a more complete
understanding of the factors governing reproduction.

Whether the interest is in conception or contraception, in
chemical or mechanical contraception or in rhythm, in genetic
counseling or mental retardation or cerebral palsy, the basic
knowledge necessary is largely the same. There must be an
understanding of the role and functioning of the ovary and the
testes, of the egg and the sperm, of the process of fertilization
itself, and the normal course of gestation. This is knowledge
we do not have and must attain.

Any overall strategy for the development of new agents or
methods of fertility control must include not only basic re-
search in the biology of reproduction, but also clinical trials,
and related toxicological investigations, the development of
new products and techniques, and the continuing evaluation
of new methods with regard to both effectiveness and short-
term and long-term safety. It is essential, too, that extensive
critical evaluation be made of the total effects of existing
methods of contraception.

The limited amount of usable knowledge of human repro-
duction and fertility control is the result of the lack of interest
we have had in this by comparison with other scientific and
technological fields. As Secretary Richardson acknowledged in
the Department of Health, Education and Welfare Five-Year
Plan for Family Planning Services and Population Research:

... in spite of its transcendent importance to human ex-
istance, reproduction has received relatively little scientific
attention. Even with today's concern for the population
problem, the most talented among young investigators all
too frequently seek other subjects.19

It is not difficult to understand why this has been the case.
Career choices are largely shaped by the priorities that public
and private institutions set when they allocate their resources.

180

During the past two decades, as government support for sci-
ence has mushroomed, the role of government in setting sci-
entific priorities has become decisive. Our scientists have been
responsive to these priorities, creating entirely new scientific
subcommunities, where none previously existed — in defense,
space, and favored areas of medical research.

Beginning a quarter of a century ago with the formation of
a committee on human reproduction by the National Research
Council, there have been several efforts to stimulate greater
interest in fertility research. This issue has been placed before
the nation by scientists and citizens with impeccable credentials.
The results of these efforts have not come close to the com-
mitment required.

For too long, fertility control was viewed as an unacceptable
subject for public concern; private resources were required to
lead the way in supporting research in this field. Pharmaceuti-
cal companies have supported a large portion of contraceptive
research. One incomplete survey showed that their cumulative
expenditure from 1965 through 1969 amounted to $68 mil-
lion.20 It is unrealistic to rely primarily upon those companies
to do the necessary research in this field. Pharmaceutical com-
panies cannot be expected to continue to invest heavily in re-
search unless they can expect a profit from it. Some of the
kinds of contraceptives needed may not offer prospects of
profits.

A few private foundations have contributed a large share of
the money spent in reproductive research, providing over 60
percent of all of nonindustry funds expended in 1969. How-
ever, only five percent of all private funds spent on medical
research went to the population field, and it is unlikely that the
foundation investment will increase substantially.21

Presidents Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon all expressed sup-
port for increased governmental funding of fertility-related
research. The Congress has authorized up to $93 million for
population research in fiscal year 1973.22 Both President
Johnson's Committee on Population and Family Planning, and
a committee of experts appointed to advise the Secretary of
Health, Education and Welfare on the scope of research needs,
urged federal expenditures of at least $100 million; and the
latter group recommended that the total federal expenditure
rise to $250 million by fiscal year 1974.23 The Five- Year Plan
for Family Planning Services and Population Research,
drawn up by the Department of Health, Education and Wel-
fare, is based upon a federal expenditure in fiscal year 1973 of
$75 million.24 These amounts are modest in terms of society's

181

total research expenditures. They are modest in terms of the
federal government's research expenditures, but they are far
above the total amounts requested and approved for population
research. The budget for fiscal year 1973 includes only $44.8
million for this purpose — less than half of the amount author-
ized and only $5.5 million more than in the previous fiscal year.
This amount is far too small for a task which is crucial both
in dealing with the population problem and in improving the
outcome of pregnancy for women and children. It is essential
to increase support for both biomedical and behavioral re-
search related to fertility.

Support for research and training in the basic science of re-
production alone requires at least $ 1 00 million in federal funds
annually. An additional $ 1 00 million annually is required for
developmental work on methods of fertility control.25 Although
a larger component of support may be expected from nongov-
ernmental sources for some aspects of product development,
the federal government must still provide the major portion of
the funding. In addition, at least $50 million a year in federal
funds are needed for behavioral and operational research which
is discussed further in Chapter 15.

An important step in helping people throughout the world
to control their fertility more successfully is the development
of better methods of fertility control. The need is urgent, and
we would like to see all of the required funds for research in
this field become available immediately. However, it seems
clear that the capacity does not currently exist within the fed-
eral government to administer effectively such an expansion.
We believe this capacity should be developed as soon as pos-
sible; we speak to this issue in some detail in our organizational
recommendations in Chapter 16.

The Commission recommends that this nation give the
highest priority to research in reproductive biology and to
the search for improved methods by which individuals can
control their own fertility.

In order to carry out this research, the Commission rec-
ommends that the full $93 million authorized for this
purpose in fiscal year 1973 be appropriated and allo-
cated; that federal expenditures for these purposes rise
to a minimum of $150 million by 1975; and that private
organizations continue and expand their work in this
field.

182

FERTILITY-RELATED SERVICES

The justification for a national policy and program to reduce
unwanted pregnancy is independent of its demographic signi-
ficance.* From both individual and societal viewpoints, the
reduction of unwanted fertility is a highly desirable goal for
many other reasons. We have seen that unwanted and acci-
dental pregnancies are associated with serious health, social,
and economic consequences. Many couples have learned to
cope with these consequences, but they hardly contribute to an
improved quality of life for them or their children.

Couples in all socioeconomic groups experience unwanted
pregnancies, but they occur most often and have the most
serious consequences among low-income couples. Middle-
income groups have generally relied upon private physicians
for family planning services. Access to these services among
lower-income persons, who do not have private physicians,
has been severely limited. Until very recently; only private
organizations, such as Planned Parenthood, and a few local
and state health departments, attempted to provide these ser-
vices to low-income individuals. However, recognizing the
personal, economic, and health benefits of reducing unwanted
pregnancy, the federal government, since 1967, has been
striving to increase the availability of family planning through
a program of subsidized services. The response to the federal
family planning program has borne out the contention that
there is a need for family planning methods among many low-
income people, that this need is perceived, and that individuals
will voluntarily use fertility control services if these are offered
in a manner and setting that are dignified and humane.

The project grant programs, carried out by the National
Center for Family Planning Services of the Department of
Health, Education and Welfare and the Office of Economic
Opportunity, have been the principal components of the in-
creased federal effort. With a relatively modest federal invest-
ment, organized family planning programs have succeeded in
introducing modern family planning services to nearly 40
percent of low-income persons in need.26 The majority of
those in need remain unserved, however, and the number of

* Separate statements by Commissioners John N. Erlenborn (pp. 284-
285) and George D. Woods (p. 312) appear on the indicated pages,

183

hospitals, health departments, and voluntary agencies not pro-
viding services remains substantial. No organized services have
been reported in half of all counties in the country. While
P.L. 91-572, the Family Planning Services and Population
Research Act, has increased the federal authorization for sup-
port of family planning services, existing authorizations ac-
count for less than half of the funds required. The five-year
plan, prepared in accordance with P.L. 91-572, makes clear
that the delivery of services to those who need and want them
is feasible and within the capabilities of our existing health
system.27 The achievement of this objective will clearly require
additional federal authorizations and appropriations as well
as increased support for these programs from state and local
governments, and from private philanthropy. It is essential
that the current federal program be expanded, strengthened,
and provided with the resources necessary to complete its
mission.

If family planning services are maximally to assist couples
in avoiding the dependency caused by unwanted fertility, the
program cannot be limited only to those persons already clas-
sified as poor. We are therefore puzzled — and concerned —
that the definition of low income embodied in the regulations
proposed for the present federal family planning program is
set at $4,200 per annum.28 Public health programs have tra-
ditionally been designed to serve all persons who choose to
avail themselves of these services; to select family planning
services as a major departure from this policy has grave impli-
cations. We urge that no means test be applied in the admin-
istration of these programs. Their purpose must be to enlarge
personal freedom for all, not to restrict its benefits only to the
poorest of the poor.

While the current family planning program, which provides
services to low-income persons, is justified on the basis of
acute need within this group, unwanted pregnancies occur in
all segments of our society; there are many nonpoor individ-
uals who need but who do not receive adequate fertility con-
trol services.

Fertility-Related Health Services

Most Americans secure their health services through private
physicians. Yet studies show that most physicians do not per-
ceive it to be their function to actively provide fertility control
services.

184

In part, this is because of the taboos that have historically
surrounded fertility control. But it is also a result of the fact
that our medical system primarily emphasizes curative med-
icine and acute, catastrophic care rather than preventive med-
icine. For this reason, it is not just fertility-control services
that are inadequately provided, but the whole range of fer-
tility-related services including maternity and infant care.

Very few current private or public health financing mech-
anisms pay for such items as office visits, drugs, and laboratory
tests — the principal elements of contraceptive services. One
insurance company declined to pay for the cost of inserting
an intrauterine device on the grounds that such a procedure
does not "represent necessary medical care and treatment."
Costs of surgical procedures such as abortion and sterilization
are covered inadequately, if at all.

With our growing recognition of the vital importance of
adequate prenatal and infant care, it is regrettable that only a
fraction of the costs of these services are defrayed by health
financing mechanisms. Future generations of Americans
should be born wanted by their parents, brought into the world
with the best skills that modern medicine can offer, and pro-
vided with the love and care necessary for a healthy and pro-
ductive life.

The Commission recommends a national policy and volun-
tary program to reduce unwanted fertility, to improve the
outcome of pregnancy, and to improve the health of children.

In order to carry out such a program, public and private
health financing mechanisms should begin paying the
full cost of all health services related to fertility, includ-
ing contraceptive, prenatal, delivery, and postpartum
services; pediatric care for the first year of life; volun-
tary sterilization; safe termination of unwanted preg-
nancy; and medical treatment of infertility.

Estimates have been made of the costs to American society
of such a program.29 At current fees and institutional charges,
the entire gamut of services for all who would require them,
regardless of age, marital status, or income, is estimated to cost
from $6.7 to $8.1 billion annually in the next five years. More
than 70 percent of this cost would cover maternity and pedi-
atric care, while the balance constitutes the total cost of volun-
tary fertility control. Individuals, public and private third-
party mechanisms, and public health programs already finance

185

all but about $1 billion of this total cost. But many persons do
not receive all or some of these critical fertility-related health
services as a result of inadequate insurance coverage, lack of
income, differential access to medical resources, and inade-
quate public and private programs.

To place this concept in perspective, it is useful to note
that total United States health expenditures in fiscal year 1971
are estimated at $75 billion, and our gross national product at
more than $1 trillion. The cost to our society of paying for all
necessary modern medical care related to the bearing of
healthy, wanted children thus would constitute nine percent
of our national health bill, and less than 0.7 percent of GNP.
On a per capita basis, the total annual cost of such a compre-
hensive program would be $32 to $34. In fiscal year 1971, per
capita health expenditures of all types totaled $358.

These estimates do not, in fact, represent a true "cost" to
our society. The expenditure of these sums for adequate fer-
tility-related medical care would, in all probability, be more
than offset by the benefits to individuals and society of the
delivery of healthy children and the prevention of unwanted
pregnancies. One-fourth of the expenditures for the fertility-
control services (as distinguished from maternity and pediatric
care) would, in fact, be quickly offset by the elimination of
the costs of prenatal, delivery, and postnatal care resulting
from unwanted pregnancies and births.

The financing of all health services related to fertility con-
trol could easily be integrated into current publicly adminis-
tered health financing systems, and made part of a new com-
prehensive national health insurance system. Congress should
include this coverage in any health insurance system it adopts.

We wish to point out, however, that its initiation is not
dependent upon the adoption of a comprehensive national
health system. The same type of coverage could be built into
existing private insurance programs. This process could be
considerably expedited if federal, state, and local governments
would undertake responsibility for stimulating the inclusion
of such coverage in private insurance.

Service Delivery and Personal Training

The achievement of such a financing concept would remove
the economic deterrent to medical care related to childbearing.
Removal of the economic barriers would go a long way toward
making services available. However, experience in other health
financing programs has demonstrated that it would not, by

186

itself, remedy the present inequities in the distribution of
medical services. It would not create physicians in commu-
nities which currently have none or too few, nor build ade-
quate health facilities to replace obsolete ones. It would not
guarantee the availability of the necessary trained manpower,
nor provide the means whereby individuals would receive the
full range of information necessary for them to choose wisely
the services which best fit their needs.

These problems can only be remedied if, at the same time
that the basic costs are assured through comprehensive health
financing mechanisms, systematic attention is paid to the orga-
nization and delivery of fertility-related health services. The
development of health maintenance organizations and group
practice modes of delivery may help in this process. The Com-
mission believes that special attention will have to be directed
to the specific problems of fertility-related health services.

We therefore recommend creation of programs to (1)
train doctors, nurses, and paraprofessionals, including
indigenous personnel, in the provision of all fertility-
related health services; (2) develop new patterns for
the utilization of professional and paraprofessional per-
sonnel; and (3) evaluate improved methods of organiz-
ing the delivery of these services.

Family Planning Services

At the same time, federal leadership is necessary to insure
that our comprehensive health planning program undertakes
responsibility for monitoring the extent to which health ser-
vices related to fertility are actually provided through our
health system, and to initiate changes in practices and pro-
grams which are needed to insure that services are actually
available and accessible to all.

Until the time that private and public health mechanisms
have been altered to include adequate coverage and provision
of fertility-related services, the present federal programs that
provide family planning services and maternal and child care
must be continued and expanded.

The five-year plan for family planning services projects the
total fiscal requirements over the next five years at between
$392 and $434 million. While state and local governments
and private philanthropy can and should increase their com-

187

mitment to this national effort, most experts agree that by
1975, not more than $50 million can be supplied from these
sources.30 The bulk of family planning funds must come from
the federal government.

Present specific statutory authorizations for family plan-
ning services are not sufficient to meet the level of funding
required. Medicaid cannot be expected to provide much as-
sistance.

The Commission therefore recommends: (1) new legis-
lation extending the current family planning project
grant program for five years beyond fiscal year 1973
and providing additional authorizations to reach a fed-
eral funding level of $225 million in fiscal year 197 3 >
$275 million in fiscal year 1974, $325 million in fiscal
year 1975, and $400 million thereafter; (2) extension
of the family planning project grant authority of Title
V of the Social Security Act beyond 1972, and mainte-
nance of the level of funding at approximately $30
million annually; and (3) maintenance of the Title 11
OEO program at current levels of authorization.

The program elements thus far recommended would create
both a long-term basic financing mechanism for fertility-re-
lated health services and an interim program effort to build
the needed additional capacity to provide family planning
services. To complete the system of fertility-related services, it
is necessary to have an adequate information and education
program; it is not sufficient just to have services available.
People must know that they are available and must have a
full range of knowledge about methods of fertility control.
The task of informing and educating Americans in this area
is too important to be left exclusively to voluntary organiza-
tions and sporadic private efforts. It should be the responsi-
bility of society's full range of information and education
channels.

Services for Teenagers

As a society, we have been reluctant to acknowledge that
there is a considerable amount of sexual activity among un-
married young people. The national study which disclosed that
27 percent of unmarried girls 15 to 19 years old had had
sexual relations, further revealed that girls have a consider-

188

able acquaintance with contraceptive methods; over 95 per-
cent of all girls 15 to 19, for example, know about the pill.
Contraceptive practice, however, contrasts sharply with this
picture. Although many young women who have had inter-
course have used a contraceptive at some time, this age group
is characterized by a great deal of "chance taking." The
majority of these young women have either never used or, at
best, have sometimes used birth control methods.31

We deplore the various consequences of teenage pregnancy,
including the recent report from New York that teenagers ac-
count for about one-quarter of the abortions performed under
their new statute during its first year.32 Adolescent pregnancy
offers a generally bleak picture of serious physical, psycho-
logical, and social implications for the teenager and the child.
Once a teenager becomes pregnant, her chances of enjoying
a rewarding, satisfying life are diminished. Pregnancy is the
number one cause for school drop-out among females in the
United States. The psychological effects of adolescent preg-
nancy are indicated by a recent study that estimated that
teenage mothers have a suicide attempt rate 10 times that of
the general population.33

The Commission is not addressing the moral questions in-
volved in teenage sexual behavior. However, we are con-
cerned with the complex issue of teenage pregnancy. There-
fore, the Commission believes that young people must be
given access to contraceptive information and services.

Toward the goal of reducing unwanted pregnancies and
childbearing among the young, the Commission recom-
mends that birth control information and services be
made available to teenagers in appropriate facilities
sensitive to their needs and concerns.

The Commission recognizes that the availability of con-
traceptive services alone is insufficient. It has recently been
reported that among teenagers, the single most important rea-
son given for not using contraceptives was the belief that, for
various reasons, they could not become pregnant. Our survey
reveals that nearly two-thirds of our citizens are in favor of
high schools offering information on ways to avoid preg-
nancy.34

Young people whose family-building years lie in the future
and whose options will depend on their understanding of fer-
tility control and services available to them, must have ac-
curate information about these matters.

189

The Commission therefore recommends the develop-
ment and im lemeniation of an adequately financed
program to develop appropriate family planning mate-
rials, to conduct training courses for teachers and school
administrators, and to assist states and local communi-
ties in integrating information about family planning
into school courses such as hygiene and sex education.

190

CHAPTER 12. POPULATION STABILIZATION

THE COMMISSION'S PERSPECTIVE

Soon after the Commission's first meeting in June 1970, it
became evident that the question of population stabilization
would be a principal issue in its deliberations. A population
has stabilized when the number of births has come into bal-
ance with the number of deaths, with the result that, the effects
of immigration aside, the size of the population remains
relatively constant. We recognize that stabilization will only
be possible on an average over a period of time, as the annual
numbers of births and deaths fluctuate. The Commission
further recognizes that to attain a stablized population would
take a number of decades, primarily because such a high pro-
portion of our population today is now entering the ages of
marriage and reproduction.

As our work proceeded and we received the results of stud-
ies comparing the likely effects of continued growth with the
effects of stabilization, it became increasingly evident that no
substantial benefits would result from continued growth of
the nation's population. This is one of the basic conclusions
we have drawn from our inquiry. From the accumulated evi-
dence, we further concluded that the stabilization of our popu-
lation would contribute significantly to the nation's ability to
solve its problems. It was evident that moving toward stabili-
zation would provide an opportunity to devote resources to
problems and needs relating to the quality of life rather
than its quantity. Stabilization would "buy time" by slowing

191

the pace at which growth-related problems accumulate and
enhancing opportunities for the orderly and democratic work-
ing out of solutions.

The Commission recognizes that the demographic implica-
tions of most of our recommended policies concerning child-
bearing are quite consistent with a goal of population stabili-
zation. In this sense, achievement of population stabilization
would be primarily the result of measures aimed at creating
conditions in which individuals, regardless of sex, age, or
minority status, can exercise genuine free choice. This means
that we must strive to eliminate those social barriers, laws,
and cultural pressures that interfere with the exercise of free
choice and that governmental programs in the future must be
sensitized to demographic effects.*

Recognizing that our population cannot grow indefinitely,
and appreciating the advantages of moving now toward the
stabilization of population, the Commission recommends that
the nation welcome and plan for a stabilized population.

There remain a number of questions which must be an-
swered as the nation follows a course toward population
stabilization. How can stabilization be reached? Is there any
particular size at which the population should level off, and
when should that occur? What "costs" would be imposed by
the various paths to stabilization, and what costs are worth
paying?

CRITERIA FOR PATHS TO STABILIZATION1

An important group in our society, composed predomi-
nantly of young people, has been much concerned about popu-
lation growth in recent years. Their concern emerged quite
rapidly as the mounting pollution problem received wide-
spread attention, and their goal became "zero population
growth." By this, they meant in fact sterilization — bringing
births into balance with deaths. To attain their objective, they
called for the 2-child family. They recognize, of course, that
many people do not marry and that some who do marry either

* A separate statement by Commissioner Paul B. Comely, M.D., ap-
pears on pages 265-266.

192

are not able to have or do not want to have children, per-
mitting wide latitude in family size and attainment of the
2-child average.

Some called for zero growth immediately. But this would
not be possible without considerable disruption to society.
While there are a variety of paths to ultimate stabilization,
none of the feasible paths would reach it immediately. Our
past rapid growth has given us so many young couples that,
even if they merely replaced themselves, the number of births
would still rise for several years before leveling off. To pro-
duce the number of births consistent with immediate zero
growth, they would have to limit their childbearing to an
average of only about one child. In a few years, there would
be only half as many children as there are now. This would
have disruptive effects on the school system and subsequently
on the number of persons entering the labor force. Thereafter,
a constant total population could be maintained only if this
small generation in turn had two children and their grand-
children had nearly three children on the average. And then
the process would again have to reverse, so that the overall
effect for many years would be that of an accordion-like
continuous expansion and contraction.2

From considerations such as this, we can begin to develop
criteria for paths toward population stabilization. It is highly
desirable to avoid another baby boom. Births, which averaged
3.0 million annually in the early 1920's, fell to a 2.4 million
average in the 1930's, rose to a 4.2 million average in the late
1950's and early. 1960's, and fell to 3.6 million in 1971.3 These
boom and bust cycles have caused disruption in elementary
and high schools and subsequently in the colleges and in the
labor market. And the damage to the long-run career aspira-
tions of the baby-boom generation is only beginning to be felt.
The assimilation of the baby-boom generation has been
called "population peristalsis," comparing it to the process in
which a python digests a pig. As it moves along the digestive
tract, the pig makes a big bulge in the python. While the
imagery suggests the appearance of the baby-boom generation
as it moves up the age scale and through the phases of the
life cycle, there is reason to believe that the python has an
easier time with the pig than our nation is having providing
training, jobs, and opportunity for the generation of the
baby boom.

Thus, we would prefer that the path to stabilization involve
a minimum of fluctuations from period to period in the num-
ber of births. For the near future, these considerations rec-
ommend a course toward population stabilization which

193

would reduce the echo expected from the baby-boom genera-
tion as it moves through the childbearing ages and bears
children of its own.

Our evidence also indicates that it would be preferable for
the population to stabilize at a lower rather than a higher
level. Our population will continue to grow for decades more
before stabilizing, even if those now entering the ages of re-
production merely replace themselves. The population will
grow as the very large groups now eight to 25 years of age —
the products of the postwar baby boom — grow older and
succeed their less numerous predecessors. How much growth
there will be depends on the oncoming generations of young
parents.

Some moderate changes in patterns of marriage and child-
bearing are necessary for any move toward stabilization.
There are obvious advantages to a path which minimizes the
change required and provides a reasonable amount of time
for such change to occur.

Population stabilization under modern conditions of mor-
tality means that, on the average, each pair of adults will
give birth to two children. This average can be achieved in
many ways. For example, it can be achieved by varying com-
binations of nonmarriage or childlessness coexisting in a pop-
ulation with substantial percentages of couples who have more
than two children. On several grounds, it is desirable that
stabilization develop in a way which encourages variety and
choice rather than uniformity.

We prefer, then, a course toward population stabilization
which minimizes fluctuations in the number of births; mini-
mizes further growth of population; minimizes the change
required in reproductive habits and provides adequate time
for such changes to be adopted; and maximizes variety and
choice in life styles, while minimizing pressures for con-
formity.

AN ILLUSTRATION OF AN OPTIMAL PATH4

Our research indicates that there are some paths to stabili-
zation that are clearly preferable. These offer less additional
population growth, involve negligible fluctuations in births,
provide for a wide range of family sizes within the population,
and exact moderate "costs" — that is, changes in marriage and j

194

childbearing habits, which are in the same direction as cur-
rent trends.

A course such as the following satisfies these criteria quite
well. (The calculations exclude immigration; the demographic
role of immigration is reviewed in the next chapter.)

In this illustration, childbearing would decline to a replace-
ment level in 20 years. This would result if: ( 1 ) the proportion
of women becoming mothers declined from 88 to 80 percent;
(2) the proportion of parents with three or more children
declined from 50 to 41 percent; and (3) the proportion of
parents with one or two children rose from 50 to 59 percent.
Also in this illustration, the average age of mothers when
their first child is born would rise by two years, and the
average interval between births would rise by less than six
months. The results of these changes would be that the
United States population would gradually grow until it stabi-
lizes, in approximately 50 years, at a level of 278 million (plus
the confribution from the net inflow of immigrants). Periodic
fluctuations in the number of births would be negligible.

The size of the population in the year 2000 will depend
bo'h on how fast future births occur as well as on the ultimate
number of children people have over a lifetime. Over the
next 10 to 15 years especially, we must expect a large number
of births from the increasing numbers of potential parents,
unless these young people offset the effect of their numbers
by waiting somewhat before having their children. Postpone-
ment and stretching-out of childbearing, accompanied by a
gradual decline in the number of children that people have
over a lifetime, can effectively reduce the growth we shall
otherwise experience.

Beyond this, there are persuasive health and personal rea-
sons for encouraging postponement of childbearing and bet-
ter spacing of births. Infants of teenage mothers are subject
to higher risks of premature birth, infant death, and lifetime
physical and mental disability than children of mothers in
their twenties.5 If the 17 percent of all births occurring to
teenage mothers were postponed to later ages, we would see
a distinct improvement in the survival, health, and ability of
these children.

It is obvious that the population cannot be fine-tuned to
conform to any specific path. The changes might occur sooner
or later than in this illustration. If they took place over 30
years instead of 20 we should expect nine million more people
in the ultimate stabilized population — or 287 million rather
than 278 million. Or if the average age at childbearing rose

195

only one year instead of two, we would end up with 10
million more people than otherwise.

On the other hand, suppose we drifted toward a replace-
ment level of fertility in 50 years instead of 20, and none of
the other factors changed. In that case, the population would
stabilize at 330 million. In other words, following this route
would result in 50 million more Americans than the one
illustrated above.

THE LIKELIHOOD OF POPULATION STABILIZATION

Many developments — some old and some recent — enhance
the likelihood that something close to an optimal path can
be realized, especially if the Commission's recommendations
bearing on population growth are adopted quickly.

1. The trend of average family size has been downward —
from seven or eight children per family in colonial times to
less than three children in recent years — interrupted, however,
by the baby boom.

2. The birthrate has declined over the past decade and
showed an unexpected further decline in 1971.

3. The increasing employment of women, and the move-
ment to expand women's options as to occupational and family
roles and life styles, promise to increase alternatives to the
conventional role of wife-homemaker-mother.

4. Concern over the effects of population growth has been
mounting. Two-thirds of the general public interviewed in the
Commission's survey in 1971 felt that the growth of the
United States population is a serious problem. Half or more
expressed concern over the impact of population growth on
the use of natural resources, on air and water pollution, and
on social unrest and dissatisfaction.6

5. Youthful marriage is becoming less common than it was
a few years ago. While 20 percent of women now in their
thirties married before age 18, only 13 percent of the young
women are doing so now.7 It remains to be seen whether this
represents a postponement of marriage or a reversal of the
trend toward nearly universal marriage.

6. The family-size preferences of young people now enter-
ing the childbearing ages are significantly lower than the
preferences reported by their elders at the same stage in life.

7. The technical quality of contraceptives has increased

196

greatly in the past 10 years, although irregular and ineffective
use still results in many unplanned and unwanted births.

8. The legalization of abortion in a few states has resulted
in major increases in the number of legal abortions. The evi-
dence so far indicates that legalized abortion is being used by
many women who would otherwise have had to resort to
illegal and unsafe abortions. The magnitude of its effect on
the birthrate is not yet clear.8

9. The experience of many other countries indicates the
feasibility of sustained replacement levels of reproduction.9
Within the past half century, Japan, England and Wales,
France, Denmark, Norway, West Germany, Hungary, Swe-
den, and Switzerland have all experienced periods of replace-
ment or near-replacement fertility lasting a decade or more.
Additional countries have had shorter periods at or near
replacement levels. While much of this experience occurred
during the Depression of the 1930's, much of it also occurred
since then. Furthermore, during that period, contraceptive
technology was primitive compared to what is available today.

On the basis of these facts, the nation might ask, "why
worry," and decide to wait and see what happens. Our judg-
ment is that we should not wait. Acting now, we encourage
a desirable trend. Acting later, we may find ourselves in a
position of trying to reverse an undesirable trend. We should
take advantage of the opportunity the moment presents rather
than wait for what the unknown future holds.

The potential for a repeat of the baby boom is still here.
In 1975, there will be six million more people in the prime
childbearing ages of 20 to 29 than there were in 1970. By
1985, the figure will have jumped still another five million.
Unless we achieve some postponement of childbearing or
reduction in average family size, this is going to mean sub-
stantial further increases in the number of births.10

Furthermore, although we discern many favorable elements
in recent trends, there are also unfavorable elements which
threaten the achievement of stabilization.

1. For historical reasons which no longer apply, this nation
has an ideological addiction to growth.

2. Our social institutions, including many of our laws, often
exert a pronatalist effect, even if inadvertent.11 This includes
the images of family life and women's roles projected in
television programs; the child-saves-marriage iheme in wom-
en's magazines;12 the restrictions on the availability of con-
traception, sex education, and aborion; and many o hers.

3. There is an unsatisfactory level of understanding of the

197

role of sex in human life and of the reproductive process and
its control.

4. While the white middle-class majority bears the primary
numerical responsibility for population grow h, it is also true
that the failure of our society to bring racial minorities and
the poor into the mainstream of American life has impaired
their ability to implement small-family goals.

5. If it should happen that, in the next few years, our rate
of reproduction falls to replacement levels or below, we could
experience a strong counterreaction. In the United States in
the 1930's, and in several foreign countries, the response to
subreplacement fertility has been a cry of anxiety over the
national prosperity, security, and virility. Individual countries
have found it hard to come to terms with replacement-level
fertility rates.13 About 40 years ago during the Depression,
there was great concern about "race suicide" when birthrates
fell in Western Europe and in this country. Today, several
countries approaching stabilization have expressed concerns
about possible fu ure labor shortages. The growth ethic seems
to be so imprinted in human consciousness that it takes a
deliberate effort of rationality and will to overcome it, but
that effort is now desirable.

One purpose of this report and the programs it recom-
mends is to prepare the American people to welcome a re-
placement level of reproduction and some periods of repro-
duction below replacement. The nation must face the fact
that achieving population stabilization sooner ra.her than later
would require a period of time during which annual fertility
was below replacement. During the transition to stabilization,
the postponement of childbearing would result in annual fer-
tility rates dropping below replacement, even though, over a
lifetime, the childbearing of the parents would reach a re-
placement level.

In the long-run future, we should understand that a sta-
bilized population means an average of zero growth, and there
would be times when the size of the population declines.
Indeed, zero grow.h can only be achieved realistically with
fluctuations in bo h directions. We should prepare ourselves
not to react with alarm, as some other countries have done
recemly, when the distant possibility of population decline
appears.

198

CHAPTER 13. IMMIGRATION

Because population growth has rarely been a concern of
immigration policy makers, it is especially important to study
immigration from the perspective of population policy. In the
years 1861 to 1910, the average annual immigration rate per
1,000 total population of the United States was 7.5; the rate
for the period 1911 to 1970 dropped to 1.8. The rate for the
recent period reflects a rise from the 1930's, when there was
a net outflow of migrants, to the 1960's when the rate was
2.2.1

Historically, immigration has contributed profoundly to the
growth and development of this country. In fact, we pride
ourselves on being a nation of immigrants. Traditionally, be-
cause of the desire to settle advancing frontiers and the de-
mand for labor in the expanding industries, there were few
restrictions on immigration. However, a changing situation
early in this century became reflected in new immigration poli-
cies. The skua ion is now changing again, and it is appropriate
that the Commission review the role of immigration.

THE PAST

Our nation's history repeatedly reveals the outstanding con-
tributions of immigrants. They provided much of the man-
power and initiative that setiled the colonies and opened the
west. They helped build the railroads, worked in the factories,
organized labor, succeeded at the highest levels of business
and government, and have left an indelible mark on American
arts and scholarship. Immigrants today are contributing in

199

equally significant ways, and there is every reason to expect
such benefits from immigration in the future. Our society has
been shaped by the many identities of its citizens.

In response to the needs of the economically, religiously,
and politically oppressed around the world and to our needs
as a new and growing nation, there were no significant re-
strictions on immigration until after the Civil War. In 1882,
Chinese immigrants were excluded. Later, other narrowly se-
lective requirements were imposed for health and public wel-
fare reasons. After World War I, there were strong social and
political pressures to impose tight restrictions on immigration.
The Immigration Act of 1924 defined special categories of
immigrants (close relatives, refugees) not subject to numerical
limits and set a quota of about 150,000 for all others. The
legislation was based on complicated formulas to restrict im-
migrants from certain countries in order to retain the racial
and ethnic composition of the United States population. This
system was replaced by the Immigration Act of 1965.

The 1965 legislation shifted the restrictions from national
origins to priorities based on family reunification, asylum for
refugees, and needed skills and professions. Because of past
restrictions, backlogs of demand, and the 1965 change in
policy, there has been a dramatic shift in the geographic
origins of our immigrants. From 1945 to 1965, 43 percent
of immigrants came from Europe. But, from 1966 to 1970,
only one-third of the immigants were European, while one-
third were Canadian and Latin American, and the remaining
third were West Indian, Asian, and African.2 This geographic
change has also affected the racial composition of immigrants,
increasing the number of nonwhites. Because of earlier
changes in composition, women now outnumber male immi-
grants, and there are more families with dependents.3 During
the sixties, the flow of aliens arriving for permanent residence
averaged about 332,000 per year. There were about 100,000
more such persons entering the country in 1970 than was
the case in I960.4 Because the 1965 changes in immigration
policies are so recent, it is not entirely clear whether these
adjustments will develop into long-range trends.

THE DEMOGRAPHIC IMPLICATIONS5

Immigrants are now entering the United States at a rate
of almost 400,000 per year. The relative importance of im-

200

migration as a component of poulation growth has increased
significantly as declining birthrates diminish the level of nat-
ural increase. However, the proportion of the population
which is foreign-born (about five percent) is not changing
much. Between 1960 and 1970, about 16 percent of the total
population growth was due to net immigration (the differ-
ence between the number of people entering the country and
the number leaving). However, the increasing relative sig-
nificance of immigration can be misleading for, if native births
and deaths were balanced, immigration would account for
100 percent of population growth.

If net immigration were to remain at about 400,000 per
year and all families were to have an average of two children,
then immigrants arriving between 1970 and the year 2000,
plus their descendants born here, would number 15 million
at the end of the century. This would account for almost a
quarter of the total population increase during that period.6

One should ask not only how much immigration con-
tributes to population growth, but also how seriously immi-
gration affects the advent of population stabilization. If im-
migration were to continue at the rate of about 400,000 per
year, a rate of 2.0 rather than 2. 1 children per woman would
eventually stabilize the population, though at a later date. And
the size of the population would ultimately be about eight
percent larger than if there were no international migration
whatsoever.7

If the flow of residents leaving this country were as large
as the flow of immigrants, they would balance each other and
have no impact on the growth rate. Unfortunately, no records
are kept of people permanently leaving the country; emigra-
tion statistics must rely on indirect estimates. Indications are
that emigration has been increasing recently from about 23,-
000 in 1965 to 37,000 in 1970. The most popular destinations
are Canada, Israel, and Australia, and these may possibly
account for more than half the emigrants. Emigration now is
probably only about one-tenth the volume of immigration,
but it has been proportionately larger in other periods of his-
tory. Of course, it is possible that it may increase again in
the future.

Immigration affects not only the growth of the population,
but also its distribution. It is not surprising that the settle-
ment patterns of immigrants reflect the distribution trends of
the native population, since most immigrants come to this
country either to join their relatives or obtain a job. In fact,
immigrants tend to prefer metropolitan areas and are con-
centrated in a few of the largest cities. Immigrants will con-

201

tribute about 23 percent of the population growth which is
projected to occur within fixed metropolitan boundaries be-
tween 1970 and 2000, assuming the 2-child growth rate.8 Not
only do immigrants tend to be highly metropolitan, they are
also concentrated in a few states. Two-thirds of the recent
immigrants intended to settle in six states — New York, Cali-
fornia, New Jersey, Illinois, Texas, and Massachusetts.9

ILLEGAL ALIENS

A major and growing problem associated with immigration
is that of illegal immigrants.* It is impossible to estimate pre-
cisely how many escape detection; but, during 1971, over 420,-
000 deportable aliens were located. This figure is larger than
the number of immigrants who entered legally during the same
period. Estimates place the number of illegal aliens currently
in the United States between one and two million. Most are
men seeking employment. Because the number of illegal aliens
apprehended has risen dramatically (from less than 71,000 in
1960 to over 400,000 in 1971), the number of aliens in illegal
status has probably been increasing significantly. Also, the
problem has been spreading from the southwest, along the
Mexican border, to all the major metropolitan areas across the
country.10

The economic problems exacerbated by illegal aliens are
manifold and affect the labor market and social services. It is
often profitable for employers to hire illegal aliens for low
wages and under poor working conditions; these workers will
not risk discovery of their unlawful status by complaining or
organizing. Thus, illegal aliens (who usually take unskilled
or low-skilled positions) not only deprive citizens and per-
manent resident aliens of jobs, but also depress the wage scale
and working conditions in areas where they are heavily con-
centrated. Although many aliens enter the United States in
order to work and send much of their earnings back to their
families and homeland, others are not as fortunate in finding
jobs and can be a drain on public welfare and social services.
Because of the illegal and precarious nature of their status,
these aliens are ready prey for unscrupulous lawyers, landlords,
and employers.

* A separate statement by Commissioner Alan Cranston appears on
page 271.

202

Eight out of 10 illegal aliens found are Mexicans. Most of
the others are Canadians and West Indians, although there are
also sizeable groups of Portuguese, Greeks, Italians, Chinese,
and Filipinos. Their countries were affected by immigration
policy changes in the 1965 Act, and there is considerable de-
mand and pressure for immigrant visas. The flow of illegal
immigrants could probably be reduced if the numbers of per-
manent residence visas were increased, the economic incentives
for hiring illegal aliens were eliminated, and/or the economic
advantages of obtaining a job in this country were reduced. In
any case, an aggressive enforcement program must be de-
veloped along all borders and ports of entry. Any enforcement
programs against illegal entry and possible laws against em-
ployment of illegal aliens must take special care not to infringe
upon the civil rights of Mexicans, Mexican-Americans, and
others who are legally residing here and working or seeking
work.

COMPETITION FOR WORK

In addition to the adverse economic pressures caused by
illegal aliens, it is possible that legal immigration could have
a negative impact if not regulated carefully. It is the purpose
of the labor certification program to ensure that immigrants
do not compete with indigenous labor, particularly in periods
and geographic areas of unemployment. But, only a small per-
cent of immigrants are actually required to be certified. Since
immigrants often have relatively high education and skills,
there is an economic incentive for employers and institutions
to favor them. This can work to the disadvantage of the native-
born, particularly members of minority groups and women,
who have traditionally been discriminated against and denied
opportunities to upgrade their skills.

A flow of highly trained immigrants can mask the need for
developing and promoting domestic talents — for example, in
the medical field. Although medical schools have recently been
expanding enrollments, a significant proportion of the demand
for doctors is being met by immigrants trained abroad. It ap-
pears that, without the availability of these foreign doctors, the
medical schools would be under greater pressure to increase
their enrollment and to provide more educational opportuni-
ties for all Americans — particularly minorities and women. The
fact that there are more registered Filipino doctors (about

203

7,000 ") than black doctors (about 6,000 12) practicing in the
United States shows the inequities that can arise.

If immigrants are also favored in the unskilled and semi-
skilled occupations, the discrimination should be attacked di-
rectly. Obviously, such discrimination may have other impor-
tant sources which may not be affected by immigration policy.
Thus, it is important to watch occupational trends, particularly
in metropolitan areas, to ensure employment and development
opportunities to racial and ethnic minorities. Traditionally,
regardless of their ethnic origins, immigrants have started em-
ployment at the lowest levels and worked their way up to gain
a measure of affluence. For various reasons, blacks have not
benefited equally. Special attention to career advancement pro-
grams and promotion practices, as well as hiring, is needed to
permit blacks to travel the same economic path and have the
same opportunities as immigrants.

RECOMMENDATIONS

The Commission believes that it is imperative for this coun-
try to address itself, first, to the problems of its own disadvan-
taged and poor. The flow of immigrants should be closely
regulated until this country can provide adequate social and
economic opportunities for all its present members, particularly
those traditionally discriminated against because of race, eth-
nicity, or sex.

Thus, the Commission believes that an effectively imple-
mented and flexible labor certification program is necessary to
ensure that immigrants do not compete with residents for work.
Immigration policies must react quickly to changes in domestic
unemployment rates and in occupational and geographic shifts
in the labor force. Also, national manpower planners and
immigration officials ought to be aware of the more subtle form
of discrimination related to immigration. A readily available
source of trained professionals from other countries may slow
the development of domestic talents and the expansion of
training facilities. While this importation of talent may be
economical for the United States, it is not fair either to the
foreign countries that educate the professionals or to our own
citizens — particularly those minority groups and women whose
access to professional training and economic advancement has
been limited.

In order for Congress and immigration officials to consider

204

these economic problems, apply appropriate regulations, and
expect the economic conflicts to be alleviated, they must also
eliminate the flow of illegal immigrants. As has been shown,
the economic and social problems associated with illegal im-
migrants have reached significant proportions.

The Commission recommends that Congress immediately
consider the serious situation of illegal immigration and pass
legislation which will impose civil and criminal sanctions on
employers of illegal border-crossers or aliens in an immigra-
tion status in which employment is not authorized.
• — t

To implement this policy, the Commission recommends
provision of increased and strengthened resources con-
sistent with an effective enforcement program in appro-
priate agencies.

While the elimination of illegal aliens will alleviate the acute
problems associated with immigration, there is still the question
of the legal immigrants and their demographic impact. The
Commission recognizes the importance of the compassionate
nature of our immigration policy. We believe deeply that this
country should be a haven for the oppressed. It is important
that we be in a flexible position to take part in international
cooperative efforts to find homes for refugees in special cir-
cumstances. In addition, we should continue to welcome mem-
bers of families who desire to join close relatives here. Our
humanitarian responsibilities to the international community
require consideration of matters beyond national demographic
questions.

Because the immigration issue involves complex moral, eco-
nomic, and political considerations, as well as demographic
concerns, there was a division of opinion within the Commis-
sion about policies regarding the number of immigrants. Some
Commissioners felt that the number of immigrants should be
gradually decreased, about 10 percent a year for five years.
This group was concerned with the inconsistency of planning
for population stabilization for our country and at the same
time accepting large numbers of immigrants each year. They
were concerned that the filling of many jobs in this country
each year by immigrants would have an increasingly unfavor-
able impact on our own disadvantaged, particularly when un-
employment is substantial. Finally, they were concerned be-
cause they believe that immigration does have a considerable

205

impact on United States population growth, thus making the !
stabilization objective much more difficult.

The majority felt that the present level of immigration
should be maintained because of the humanitarian aspects;
because of the contribution which immigrants have made and
continue to make to our society; and because of the impor-
tance of the role of the United States in international migration.

The Commission recommends that immigration levels not
be increased and that immigration policy be reviewed peri-
odically to reflect demographic conditions and considerations.

To implement this policy, the Commission recommends
that Congress require the Bureau of the Census, in co-
ordination with the Immigration and Naturalization
Service, to report biennially to the Congress on the
impact of immigration on the nation's demographic
situation.

206

CHAPTER 14. NATIONAL DISTRIBUTION
AND MIGRATION POLICIES

Reducing national population growth is a long-term process,
the benefits of which will be experienced over many years.
As the growth of the nation as a whole slows, so will local
growth. Unquestionably, then, many of the problems often
attributed to distribution — congestion in central cities, air pol-
lution, aesthetically unattractive suburban growth — will be
alleviated by national population stabilization. But until stabi-
lization is achieved, we must cope with the difficult problem
of where the growth occurring in the interim will be located.
And even after the national population stabilizes, problems
associated with distribution and mobility will continue to affect
the quality of life.

Prominent among traditional American values is freedom
of movement, yet blacks and other minorities are restricted in
their mobility, especially from city to suburb. Access to high
quality education is considered a right of all Americans, yet
many rural poor living in depressed regions have inadequate
skills. Environmental quality is a national goal, yet high pollu-
tion levels are common in large metropolitan areas and in
some smaller urban and rural places as well.

Ameliorating these and other problems related to popula-
tion movement and distribution will require a new approach
to policy — one that questions the belief that local population
growth is necessarily good, just as it questions the growth
ethic for the nation as a whole; one that examines where pop-
ulation growth may appropriately be encouraged as well as

207

where it may not; one that places new emphasis on helping
people directly, in addition to aiding the places where they
live; and one that gives new importance to social and environ-
mental objectives in the establishment of public policy.

AN APPROACH TO POLICY

Our traditional approach to population distribution policy
and local growth has been governed by the ethic that develop-
ment and growth are inherently good. This is a heritage from
the age of a nearly empty continent. But now we need to
recognize that continued local or regional growth in some
areas may have many undesirable consequences — possibly
even threatening the integrity of the human community or
the ecosystem.

For many of the same reasons that the nation as a whole
should welcome population stabilization, communities and
regions should begin to consider seriously whether substantial
further population growth is desirable. Several are already
doing so. While some areas may secure important gains
through an increase in population size, others have little to
gain from growth per se. In fact, it is increasingly clear that
social and environmental problems are often aggravated by
the continued growth of large population concentrations.

At the same time, communities across the country will have
to accommodate additional growth in the coming decades; the
national population will grow whether or not we eventually
achieve population stabilization. It would be just as irrespon-
sible for communities to arbitrarily erect barriers to future
growth as it would be to encourage growth for growth's sake.
This is not to say that all communities must accept unrestricted
growth. But, the accommodation of future population is a
public responsibility which must be shared by all communities
and dealt with on a broad scale.

Partly as a consequence of traditional beliefs that growth is
good, the focus of regional development policy has been to
promote the prosperity of places. The approach is based on
the philosophy that the way to ensure individual prosperity is
through place prosperity. From this perspective, the best strat-
egy to help the unemployed of a small town is to revitalize the
town through better development planning and capital invest-
ment which will attract new jobs. The fortune of the indi-

208

vidual, then, depends on the fortune of the place where he
lives.

A second approach would be to emphasize helping people
directly. If individuals can be helped to upgrade their skills,
then one might both make "their place" more attractive for
developmental investments and make the individuals them-
selves more mobile. With this policy approach, the individual's
future is not tied so inextricably to the future of his commu-
nity. Rather, through geographic and occupational mobility,
he may benefit from prosperity at home or elsewhere.

These two policies are potentially complementary. Experi-
ence has shown that training people without having appropri-
ate job opportunities available leads to frustration and dis-
appointment. The two policies suggest, on the one hand,
attracting jobs to where people live and, on the other, equip-
ping people to fill jobs wherever they may be located, and
thus enabling them to participate in a national job market
with its vastly greater range of job opportunities. The policy
emphasis in the past has been on the development of places.
A balanced program for the future would call for greater
emphasis on the development of people. Since the adequacy
of a national job market is far more readily assured than on
a community-by-community basis, such a shift in policy em-
phasis would facilitate the task of matching jobs and people.

Economic concerns have traditionally been paramount in
determining distribution patterns. They had to be, given the
need to raise levels of per capita income. But in our attempts
to maximize material well-being, we generally ignored other
factors that contribute to well-being.

In particular, social and environmental aspects of distribu-
tion were not major considerations in either private location
decisions or public policy. For example, the traditional eco-
nomic evaluation of the advantages and disadvantages of life
in metropolitan areas often has neglected many important
social costs. Today, it has become increasingly clear that, in
considering the desirability of moderating population trends
or exploring new ways to improve our living environments,
social and environmental factors must be given much more
importance in policy decisions.

THE MEANING OF A METROPOLITAN FUTURE

The United States is today experiencing three important
shifts in population: (1) migration from low-income, rural,

209

and economically depressed areas toward metropolitan areas;
(2) a movement of metropolitan population from older, and
often somewhat climatically less hospitable centers in the
northeast and midwest, toward the newer, climatically favored
centers of the south and west; and (3) an outward dispersion
of residents from the cores to the peripheries of the metro-
politan areas. The combination of these population move-
ments and the continuing increase in our total population has
resulted in the development of large metropolitan areas and
urban regions — indeed, the emergence of an almost totally
urban society.

Although comments about excessive urban size or concen-
tration are so common as to be cliches, the "anthill" image of
the "megalopolis" is a misleading guide for policy making. We
have seen that, while the percent of the population living in
large places is rising, much of this shift is due to natural in-
crease. Furthermore, the average densities of urbanized areas
are declining, not rising. We have suggested that the appropri-
ate scale at which to grasp emerging settlement patterns in-
cludes the metropolitan area, but goes beyond it to the urban
region — a constellation of urban centers dispersing outward.
Basically, the urban region is an adaptation of adjacent urban
centers to underlying economic change and to most Amer-
icans' desire for dispersed suburban living. The easy commu-
nication among urban places in urban regions permits the
smaller metropolitan areas to benefit from the economic ad-
vantages of agglomeration, while avoiding some of the penal-
ties of excessive size and density. Future problems of both
urban regions and the metropolis will stem, in large part, from
unresolved issues of territorial and governmental structure
and restrictions on residential location, not from size or den-
sity.

The transition to a metropolitan society in many ways has
been beneficial, at least in terms of raising living standards
and enhancing personal opportunity. Productivity and average
income are higher and inequalities among residents are less
pronounced in these areas than elsewhere. Some of the benefits
are a result of the absolute size of a metropolitan area. Other
benefits are associated with relative size. For example, the
largest urban center of a region — whether it has 500,000 or
5,000,000 people — usually has the best cultural and health
facilities in the region. For whatever reasons, compared to
their counterparts in rural areas and small towns, the residents 1 1
of larger metropolitan centers on the average have access to
better health and education facilities, higher income, a wider I
range of employment and cultural opportunities, and broader |

210

avenues of economic improvement for disadvantaged mem-
bers of the population.

While these benefits accompany metropolitan living, many
urban Americans, though more prosperous than they would
be in small towns, seem unhappy with the conditions under
which they live. They are sensitive to the liabilities which have
accompanied metropolitan growth, even if these liabilities
have not always been caused by such growth.

As part of living in large metropolitan areas, the average
resident is subjected to high levels of pollution and crime, con-
gestion of all sorts, and inadequate access to the outdoors.
Moreover, the scale of many metropolises promotes larger
slums and ghettos. This scale effect almost inherently increases
the separation created by all forms of segregation. Less defin-
able, but no less real to many people, is a feeling of loneliness,
impersonality, alienation, and helplessness fostered by being
an insignificant one of millions.

Finally, total urbanization and the dominance of metropol-
itan areas can involve the loss of certain social and community
values associated with small-town living. It may carry with it
some loss of diversity in living environments — a diversity that
is valuable in itself and as an indicator of freedom of residen-
tial choice.

A DUAL STRATEGY

How one balances out these considerations is necessarily a
subjective matter. The evolution of the United States into a
metropolitan society with many large urban areas presents
both opportunities and liabilities.

Nevertheless, the Commission believes that the losses result-
ing from a continuation of current trends in population distri-
bution are sufficiently serious that we should attempt to mod-
erate them. We believe that encouraging the growth of selected
urban centers in economically depressed regions in the United
States might well enhance opportunities significantly for the
residents of those regions. We have seen that the cultivation
of growth in smaller centers might assist in the decongestion
of settlement in urban regions. Furthermore, creating oppor-
tunities in these smaller centers might aid in providing a
greater variety of alternative living environments.

However, on the evidence presented to us, we also recognize

211

that powerful economic and demographic trends are not easily
modified. Previous government efforts to this end, both in the
United States and abroad, have not been marked by con-
spicuous success. Whatever future success we may have in
moderating current trends, most of our population now and
in the future will live in metropolitan areas, and serious popu-
lation distribution problems exist in these areas. Accordingly,
we also believe that new and better efforts must be made to
plan for and guide metropolitan growth.

Cities, suburbs, small towns, and farms have all provided
congenial environments for Americans. But, it may not be
possible to accommodate every combination of tastes; it would
obviously be impossible, for example, to combine Manhattan's
high-density working environment with single-family suburban
homes for all who now work there. Nevertheless, in the pro-
cess of guiding population movement, we should seek to en-
hance choices of living environments for all members of soci-
ety to the extent that is possible.

However, promotion of congenial environments and places
of opportunity might well be meaningless for disadvantaged
people who, because of physical remoteness and immobility,
are often denied access to opportunities. A man in an isolated
rural town finds it very difficult, if not impossible, to take
advantage of a thriving job market in a city several hours
away. Similarly, suburban jobs are often too many bus hours
away for the central-city black to commute on a daily basis.
Whether consciously imposed, or a side effect of a shift in the
locations of employment opportunities, these physical barriers
create socially destructive situations which need to be rem-
edied. Whereas mobility often provides an avenue to personal
welfare, immobility or restricted access denies opportunity.
The Commission thus views the reduction of involuntary im-
mobility and restricted choice of residential location as an
important goal of any population distribution policy.

A dual strategy — of attenuating and simultaneously better
accommodating current trends in distribution — would there-
fore have several goals:

To promote high quality urban development in a manner
and location consistent with the integrity of the environ-
ment and a sense of community.

To promote a variety of life style options.

To ease the problems created by population movement
within the country.

212

To increase freedom in choice of residential location.

To further these goals, the Commission recommends that:

The federal government develop a set of national popula-
tion distribution guidelines to serve as a framework for
regional, state, and local plans and development.

Regional, state, and metropolitan-wide governmental au-
thorities take the initiative in cooperation with local govern-
ments, to conduct needed comprehensive planning and action
programs to achieve a higher quality of urban development.

The process of population movement be eased and guided
in order to improve access to opportunities now restricted by
physical remoteness, immobility, and inadequate skills, in-
formation, and experience.

Action be taken to increase freedom in choice of resi-
dential location through the elimination of current patterns
of racial and economic segregation and their attendant
injustices.

In what follows, we describe the direction that we believe
distribution guidelines should take and specific actions to
carry out the above recommendations. Fuller and more refined
goals, policies, and strategies must be generated over time,
as we learn — through experimentation with alternative mea-
sures, through further research, and through continuous moni-
toring of trends — how best to influence the pattern that popu-
lation redistribution takes.

GUIDING URBAN EXPANSION

The emergence of large regions of urban settlement re-
quires that considerations about our environment and quality
of life be reconciled with the forces that propel urban growth.
How can we achieve more desirable patterns of growth than
previously enjoyed, secure ecological balance, enhance the

213

quality of life, and promote the ability of the poor and mi-
norities to enjoy the opportunities of metropolitan areas?

In the 1960's, about 75 percent of national growth occurred
within the boundaries of metropolitan areas as defined in
1960; most of that growth was suburban. In the future, re-
gardless of public policy, an even larger portion of national
growth is likely to be metropolitan. Accommodating future
national growth, then, is primarily a job of accommodating
future suburban growth and of sensibly guiding the trans-
formation of currently rural territory to urban uses as metro-
politan areas physically expand. How the character and form
of the next generation of suburbs develops will play a large
role in determining the quality of life of the vast numbers of
Americans living in these areas across the country. Will their
residents have access to open space, jobs, and community
facilities? Will they live in an uncongested clean, environ-
ment? Will they be more satisfied in the new settlements than
they are in the present suburbs?

The problems and possible solutions for promoting orderly
urban growth are not new. Not long ago, the Douglas Com-
mission on Urban Problems explored these questions in detail.
Our Commission deals with these issues in recognition of the
fact that the major portion of future growth will be metro-
politan. As the scale of metropolitan areas increases, the im-
portance of effective planning becomes even greater. While
recognition of this need is not new, our findings suggest a
degree of urgency not understood before. The territory of
urban regions is expected to double between 1960 and 1980,
and to grow at a slower rate after that. This means that the
land we occupy in the year 2000 is largely being settled now.
If we settle it badly now, we shall endure the consequences
then.

To achieve effective planning and community development,
we need not only more knowledge of how things might be
made better, for much is known in this area, but also a new
commitment on the part of government and the private sector
to do things differently. Moreover, if we are going to achieve
a high quality urban environment, marginal changes will not
be sufficient. Local governments should broaden their interests
and responsibilities beyond local parochial concerns and be
responsive to metropolitan and regional objectives. Where
necessary, the power of planning and implementation will
have to be transferred to a regional or metropolitan-wide au-
thority or government. The logical level from which to guide
urban growth is the regional or metropolitan scale.

The interdependence of different aspects of metropolitan

214

areas is evident. The transportation system influences land-use
patterns, which in turn influence housing patterns, which in
turn influence transportation patterns, and so forth. The
system of financing public services influences the quality
of education which influences where people seek to live. The
expanding employment in the suburbs affects employment pat-
terns in the central city. Yet most local governments within
metropolitan areas traditionally have planned with little re-
gard for the effect of their actions on neighboring communi-
ties. Where a comprehensive approach has been taken by
metropolitan or regional planning agencies, the results have
largely been limited because of a lack of both funds and
authority to establish priorities and enforce planning deci-
sions. The increased complexity and scale make the continued
fragmentary approaches to metropolitan planning and de-
velopment progressively more costly and wasteful. This sug-
gests that the basic responsibilities for planning settlement
patterns, new public facilities, and public services should be
at the metropolitan level. To encourage this comprehensive
approach and local cooperation, the major portion of federal
funds to support planning activities in metropolitan areas
should go to the appropriate multi-purpose area-wide plan-
ning agency. These agencies, in turn, can support planning
efforts for individual jurisdictions within the metropolitan
area.

To anticipate and guide future urban growth, the
Commission recommends comprehensive land-use and
public-facility planning on an overall metropolitan and
regional scale.

The quality of life in an urban area depends largely on
how its land is used — the location and character of housing,
the amount and accessibility of open space, the compatibility
of adjacent land uses, the transportation system. Land-use
regulations, principally zoning and subdivision regulations, are
the chief government tools to influence local land-use patterns
and the character of development.

In the past, these controls have been used by local gov-
ernments largely to prevent undesired uses of land and to
protect its market value. This approach has sometimes re-
sulted in the exploitation of land for private gain instead of
public benefit. Public objectives such as provision of open
space or adequate low-income housing have often been sec-
ondary.

In addition, governments have had little control over the

215

timing of development. This has produced a haphazard pat-
tern of development where land is jumped over when it is to
the economic advantage of the developer, but not necessarily
in the public interest. Land is wasted and the public provision
of sewers, waterlines, and electricity becomes more expensive.
In order to promote environmental, social, and economic
objectives, governments must begin to ask what the best use
of land would be. New development should satisfy such public
needs as ample open space and efficient and equitable trans-
portation. It should not violate the environmental integrity
or the social viability of the community. For example, devel-
opers should not be permitted to cut down valuable trees in-
discriminately or skim off topsoil simply to reduce building
costs. New concern for the relationship of land use to en-
vironmental quality suggests that this change in attitude has
already begun. But, we still have a long way to go.

The Commission recommends that governments exercise
greater control over land-use planning and development.

This could be achieved through: (1) early public acquisi-
tion of land in the path of future development to be used
subsequently as part of a transportation system or for open
space; (2) establishment of taxes and easements to influence
the use of land and timing of development; (3) establishment
of a state zoning function to oversee the use of the land; and
(4) establishment of special zoning to control the develop-
ment of land bordering public facilities such as highways and
airports.

Suburban development need not have the sprawling, aes-
thetically monotonous character of many suburbs built during
the 1950's and 196CTs. The many amenities and public services
now found in suburbia could be improved. This could be done
at lower costs, while producing a more pleasing environment
than would result if traditional practices were followed. With
sensitive planning and development, new suburbs could en-
courage the sense of community now often lacking. Moreover,
in an attempt to satisfy a diversity of preferences, a variety of
living environments could be built, from low to high density,
small town to cosmopolitan setting.

Although the conventional forms of suburban growth have
been fostered by a variety of factors, the role of local zoning
is prominent. Through lot-by-lot zoning, even those developers
wishing to build comprehensive and imaginative develop-
ments encounter difficulty under the constraints of local zon-
ing regulations and subdivision ordinances which designate

216

lot sizes, street frontage, house placement, and even the floor
space of a house.

In contrast to the usual fragmented process of urban devel-
opment, a large-scale approach presents more opportunity for
experimentation and innovation in site design and the building
of community facilities. Unless current zoning and subdivi-
sion regulations are changed, however, the potential oppor-
tunities offered by large-scale development will not be realized.
Controls must be more flexible to permit new approaches to
community development, such as substituting general devel-
opment guidelines for specific zoning regulations. There is no
guarantee that large-scale development will result in high
quality. That will require cooperation between developers
and government to ensure the promotion of public objectives.
But large-scale development offers an opportunity to achieve
a high quality living environment

We are already seeing some of this in planned unit develop-
ments and new towns. Designers of planned unit developments
are permitted greater flexibility in site design and freedom to
combine building types. In return for freedom to disregard lot-
by-lot zoning regulations, developers must satisfy require-
ments for the entire project, and proposed plans receive
discretionary public review.

A more comprehensive and larger type of development is
the new town or community. These larger developments can
theoretically include all the facilities and activities of a city —
including shops and offices, entertainment, and health centers.
New towns usually are located either within the central city
as a new town in-town, or at the periphery of a metropolitan
area as a satellite city. They present the opportunity not only
for comprehensive planning, but also for subsequent control
of the location, timing, and sequence of land development.

However, innovation, even in planned unit developments
and new communities, will be limited unless the federal and
state governments provide some form of financial assistance
to support experimentation. Though the form of assistance
would have to be carefully determined, substantial support of
experimentation, particularly when the techniques developed
could be transferred to other areas, would seem very desirable.

Racial Minorities and the Poor

Historically, the cities of the United States have provided
both social and economic advancement to the deprived. Dis-
advantaged immigrant groups have traditionally shed many

217

of their problems by moving to the city. They have become
part of the political, social, and economic life of the country.
By and large, however, this process has not worked well for
the blacks. Institutional racism has been more pervasive and
persistent than earlier forms of ethnic discrimination, and
serious inequities remain in education, housing, and employ-
ment. These inequities are continuing sources of social con-
flict, polarization, and isolation. As racial cleavages attain a
geographic character, they can only aggravate existing social
and economic distinctions. Until the restrictions on the move-
ment of nonwhites to areas of opportunity — geographic as
well as economic and social — are eliminated, their participa-
tion in society as full citizens will be incomplete.

Four years ago the National Advisory Commission on Civil
Disorders said: "Our nation is moving toward two societies,
one black, one white — separate and unequal." It added that
"white society is deeply implicated in the ghetto." In the inter-
vening years, little if any progress has been made to diminish
the isolation of the disadvantaged. If there is any hope for a
future where all people can realize common opportunities,
the behavior, if not the attitudes, of whites and their institu-
tions needs to be changed so they will no longer support
racism.

Resistance to a geographically open society may not be as
universal as newspaper headlines imply. According to the
Commission's survey, only 26 percent of Americans believe
that racial integration in the suburbs is proceeding "too fast,"
and 60 percent thought it was "too slow" or "just right."
Furthermore, in a survey conducted for the Commission on
Civil Disorders, nearly half of the black respondents pre-
ferred to live in a mixed neighborhood, another third did not
care, and only 13 percent preferred all black or mostly black
neighborhoods. These results can be viewed as a broad com-
mitment of the black population to mixed neighborhoods.

To help dissolve the territorial basis of racial polariza-
tion, the Commission recommends vigorous and con-
certed steps to promote free choice of housing within
metropolitan areas.

Even without further legislation, federal agencies could do
much to promote housing integration simply by changing ad-
ministrative practices. This would require that the federal
government become more alert to local housing practices
and establish an active program to guarantee local compliance
with housing laws. An additional means for pursuing these

218

objectives might be the establishment of institutions which
could buy housing in white suburbs and subsequently rent or
sell them to ethnic and racial minorities. Where such programs
are already operating effectively, they should be expanded
and strengthened.

The disparity between white and black incomes has obvi-
ously been caused by many factors operating over the years,
not the least of which is discrimination. But perhaps because
of discrimination, there are other contributing factors, such
as differences in education and health, which would put blacks
and other minorities at an occupational disadvantage even
without racial discrimination in the labor markets.

To remove the occupational sources of racial polariza-
tion, the Commission recommends the development of
more extensive human capital programs to equip black
and other deprived minorities for fuller participation in
economic life*

This will require a coordinated set of programs including
education, health, vocational development, and job counsel-
ing. Greater communication and cooperation are needed
among the various organizations — public, nonprofit, corporate
— involved in these programs to make them effective.

Racial discrimination, inadequate training, and poor public
services are only three of a variety of conditions which help
perpetuate poverty in urban areas. An additional factor is
specifically related to the location and types of jobs and hous-
ing available to blacks and the poor. Access to employment,
particularly jobs offering opportunities for advancement, is
often restricted not only by the inability of the poor to satisfy
job requirements, but also the physical inaccessibility of many
jobs. Blacks and the poor are, in part, locked out of jobs
because they cannot get to the suburbs where opportunities
open up. Reverse commuting can be expensive, time consum-
ing, and difficult. Suburban housing, while closer to job op-
portunities, is often too expensive or simply unavailable
because of racial discrimination.

While the absence in the suburbs of an adequate supply of
low- and moderate-income housing available to all races is
certainly not the sole or even the primary cause of unemploy-
ment or underemployment in the central city, it is a con-
tributing factor which needs to be remedied.

To reduce restrictions on the entry of low- and moderate-
income people to the suburbs, the Commission reconir

219

mends that federal and state governments ensure provi-
sion of more suburban housing for low- and moderate-
income families.

At least two approaches could be used to increase the supply
of suburban housing within the financial reach of low- and
moderate-income families. First, ways could be found to lower
the cost of some new or renovated suburban housing and
still meet the requirements of standard quality housing. Sec-
ond, families could be given some type of financial assistance
to supplement the amount of money they can afford to pay
for housing. But neither approach will succeed unless suburbs
accept some responsibility to ensure that an appropriate
amount of their housing stock is accessible to low- and
moderate-income families. One would hope that this would
be voluntary, and there are some signs that this is beginning
to occur. But acceptance of this responsibility should be en-
couraged by federal, state, and local governments. For ex-
ample, federal and state funds and grants could be made
dependent on whether the locality fulfilled requirements relat-
ing to the amount of land or numbers of housing units
designated for low- and moderate-income housing. Whatever
methods are used, the increased supply of housing should be
scattered throughout the suburbs to avoid a repetition of the
economic and racial residential segregation now found in most
metropolitan areas.

We must distinguish sharply the long-run national policy
of eliminating the ghetto from a short-run need to make the
ghetto a more satisfactory place to live. It is clear that im-
proving conditions in the ghetto does not constitute an accept-
able long-run solution to the racial discrimination which
created the ghetto. But if we wait for the long-run solution,
we shall bypass the present need for better schools, housing,
public transportation, recreational facilities, parks, and shop-
ping facilities.

These needs illustrate the imbalances between demands
on government and resources available to meet them, which
accompany the fragmentation of local government within
metropolitan areas. These imbalances arise in large part be-
cause local public services depend so heavily on locally raised
revenues produced by locally applied taxes (principally, of
course, the property tax). The present situation invites, in
fact encourages, income and racial segregtion between local
communities — the flight of the well-to-do from cities to sub-
urbs to which access is limited by zoning. It should not be
surprising that people move with an eye to their economic

220

self-interest. A major part of the problem lies in a system that
induces people — acting in their own self-interest — to act in
such ways as to produce the collective consequences that we
see when we examine the levels of segregation and disparities
between needs and resources within metropolitan areas.

To promote a more racially and economically integrated
society, the Commission recommends that actions be
taken to reduce the dependence of local jurisdictions on
locally collected property taxes.

We recognize the complexity of trying to determine the
best means of carrying out this objective and are not in a
position to recommend one best alternative. However, any
kind of tax program adopted should be progressive in nature
and should provide for the distribution of revenues among
jurisdictions according to need.

DEPRESSED RURAL AREAS

Rural-to-urban migration has left behind undereducated
underskilled persons in locales that have fallen into economic
and social decline.* This is not to suggest that all rural places
are suffering from economic obsolescence. On the contrary,
many small communities are viable and prosperous. But the
economic development of the United States can be traced
through the impact it has had on the distribution of popula-
tion in this country. The decline of Appalachia and the
growth of Texas reflect in part the shift from coal to gas and
oil as sources of fuel. The shift from rural areas of the mid-
continent and the south to metropolitan areas and the coasts
reflect increases in the productivity of agriculture and the new
dominance of distinctively urban occupations. Accompanying
the ascendance of highway and air transport, we have seen
the decline of the railroad town. In the process, many places
have simply outlived their economic function. Their remain-
ing residents are often ill-equipped to migrate or to cope with
increasingly difficult conditions where they now live.

In chronically depressed areas, it may sometimes be true
that the prudent course is to make the process of decline more

* A separate statement by Commissioner Alan Cranston appears on
pages 272-273.

221

orderly and less costly — for those who decide to remain in
such areas as well as for those who leave. This would hold
true if economic analysis discloses that no reasonable amount
of future investment could forestall the necessity for popula-
tion decline as an adjustment to the decline in job opportuni-
ties. In that event, the purpose of future investment in such
areas should be to make the decline easier to bear rather than to
reverse it. In the process, we should ensure that communities
that are losing population are still able to provide such basic
social services as adequate education and health facilities. The
educational needs of a community losing population, for
example, may be no less than those in more favored com-
munities. In fact, children growing up in declining communi-
ties may be faced with more difficult problems than children
elsewhere, since many will choose to move to a new and
unfamiliar area. Rural to urban migration of southern blacks
might well have been more successful had they received qual-
ity education, training, and other vital services before leaving
rural areas.

To improve the quality and mobility potential of indi-
viduals, the Commission recommends that future pro-
grams for declining and chronically depressed rural
areas emphasize human resource development.

To enhance the effectiveness of migration, the Com-
mission recommends that programs be developed to
provide worker-relocation counseling and assistance to
enable an individual to relocate with a minimum of risk
and disruption.

Such programs should be designed to match an unemployed
worker who is unable to find work locally with job oppor-
tunities elsewhere for which he is or can become qualified.
Relocation counseling and assistance should not be designed
to accelerate migration; rather, it should offer alternatives
and facilitate the choice between remaining in a socially con-
genial and familiar location and moving to an economically
healthier, if less familiar, place.

The program should include: (1) information about job
opportunities in nearby urban centers; (2) pre-relocation sup-
portive services, such as personal and family counseling; (3)
employment interviews in potential destination areas; (4)
coordination and assistance in the solution of problems in-
volved in moving; and (5) post-relocation supportive services
such as legal, financial, and personal counseling, and assistance

222

to individuals and families in finding housing, schools and
day-care facilities, and additional training opportunities.

In general, migration from declining areas is frequently
ill-directed. It often involves a lengthy move to a distant city,
with all the difficulties of adjustment. A superior approach
may be to create new jobs nearer to or within the declining
rural areas.

To promote the expansion of job opportunities in urban
places located within or near declining areas and having
a demonstrated potential for future growth, the Com-
mission recommends the development of a growth center
strategy.

This strategy could be reinforced by assisted migration pro-
grams that would encourage relocation to growth centers as
an alternative to the traditional paths to big cities. Growth
centers could also provide many of those who are unem-
ployed and underemployed in declining areas with an oppor-
tunity to commute to new or better jobs. In such circum-
stances, more effective employment could be achieved without
altering the living environment. Equally important, such
growth centers would provide alternative destinations for
urban migrants preferring small town or city living.

The types of growth centers envisioned are expanding cities
in the 25,000 to 350,000 population range whose anticipated
growth may bring them to 50,000 to 500,000. Somewhat
lower and higher limits should be considered for the sake of
flexibility. Not every rapidly-growing city within this range
should be eligible. Only those cities that could be expected
to benefit a significant number of persons from declining
regions, as well as the unemployed within the center, should
be eligible. Thus, growth centers should be selected on the
basis of commuting and migration data, as well as data on
unemployment and job opportunities, and physical and en-
vironmental potential for absorbing more growth.

Some industries are already relocating in smaller communi-
ties which might be good growth centers. The reasons for this
new trend in plant location are varied. Some firms are looking
for a location removed from the problems of the big city, but
which still has good access to a national market through the
interstate highway system. Others may seek the type of labor
force found in small towns as opposed to the central city.
Whatever the reasons, the development has both positive and
negative aspects. It usually means new jobs and prosperity
for the small town. But by virtue of relocating, a company

223

may leave behind scores of former employees who are at
least temporarily unemployed. Recognizing the inadequacy
of existing knowledge about this trend and its potential im-
portance for policy, the Commission believes that a thorough
examination of this trend should be an important part of
future research in regional development policy.

Implementation of a growth center program will not be
easy. In recent years, the federal government has pursued,
with only limited success, a growth center strategy through
programs administered by the Economic Development Ad-
ministration, the Appalachian Regional Commission, and a
number of other regional commissions. Both economic and
political constraints have seriously hampered program effec-
tiveness. Further research, substantial increases in funding,
and better focusing of investment are clearly needed for such
a policy to succeed. Many questions concerning the criteria for
selecting growth centers and the most efficient tools to stimu-
late growth are yet to be answered. A difficult problem will
be to avoid unnecessary subsidies for places whose future
growth requires no additional stimulus. Moreover, the policy
must avoid catering to the industries and interests that profit
from growth per se, as distinct from the region-wide interest
in building a sound and diversified urban economy. Care must
also be taken to avoid simply relocating industries from one
area to another, and thereby possibly aggravating the problems
of some areas while mitigating those of others. A growth
center policy, misdirected, could inadvertently produce over-
urbanization, or merely represent a transfer, not a reduction,
of national problems.

It will be some time before the effectiveness of a growth
center policy is known. In the meantime, this policy seems
to be a promising way to improve the quality of life for
residents of declining and depressed areas. Moreover, this
policy can be made consistent with a goal of providing mi-
grants with alternative destinations to large metropolitan areas.
In doing so, a growth center policy will also help improve
the quality of life in larger metropolitan areas by reducing
the migrant-generated pressures on them.

INSTITUTIONAL RESPONSES

These policy guidelines and recommendations chart broad
directions for new initiatives. Their specific features should

224

be developed on a regional and local basis, because the prob-
lems and possibilities differ for each urban region or metro-
politan area. Attempts to take such initiatives, however, are
inhibited by the absence of adequate guidelines for translating
them into forceful and coordinated action. The necessary first
steps are to determine the appropriate role each level of gov-
ernment should have in facilitating and guiding population
movement and distribution, and to create an institutional
framework to develop and carry out these policies.

Federal

Formulation of overall policies relating to the distribution
of population and economic activity must be carried on at
the federal level. Indeed, this responsibility was clearly enun-
ciated in Title VII of the Housing and Urban Development
Act of 1970. Title VII provides for the development, at the
federal level, of a national urban growth policy to encourage
desirable patterns of urbanization, economic growth and de-
velopment of all types of communities. Congress further
stated:

. . . better patterns of urban development and revitaliza-
tion are essential to accommodate future population
growth; to prevent further deterioration of the Nation's
physical and social environment; and to make positive
contributions to improving the overall quality of life
within the Nation.

In the Act, Congress calls this policy a national urban
growth policy. We believe the policy should be a coordinated
set of guidelines to serve as a framework for regional, state,
and local plans and development. They should not be re-
stricted to either urban- or growth-related issues, but instead,
should apply to the full range of population distribution issues
relating to rural and urban people and areas, and conditions
of population decline and stabilization, as well as growth.
With this in mind, a more appropriate designation would
be national population distribution guidelines.

The recent completion of the first Report on Urban Growth,
as required under Title VII, can only be considered the initial
step in developing national population distribution guidelines.
It will be some time before these guidelines are well enunci-
ated. And it is likely that they will be continually evolving as

225

conditions change and understanding of the redistribution
process grows.

In the meatnime, the federal government should establish
a continuing effort to learn more about population movement
and distribution and to begin to shape national population
distribution guidelines.

Among the important functions which should be a part
of this continuing effort are:

To develop goals, objectives, and criteria for shaping na-
tional population distribution guidelines.

To anticipate, monitor, and appraise the distribution and
migration effects of governmental activities that influence
urban growth — defense procurement, housing and trans-
portation programs, zoning and tax laws, and so forth.

To develop a national land-use policy which would es-
tablish criteria for the proper use of land consistent
with national population distribution objectives and
guidelines.

To provide technical and financial assistance to regional,
state, metropolitan, and local governmental agencies
concerned with planning and development.

To coordinate the development and implementation of
a growth center policy.

The delegation of these functions to specific federal or-
ganizations is discussed in Chapter 16.

State

At the state level, planning and development agencies
should take an active role in the development and implemen-
tation of policies to facilitate orderly and high quality urban
development. State government is close enough to metropoli-
tan and other urban areas to be aware of their problems. In
addition, the power of zoning and other land-use regulations
resides with the state. State government, then, is in a strategic
position to develop policy guidelines for future development
and to coordinate local and metropolitan plans with state
development plans. This suggests the need for effective state
planning offices.

226

In addition to better and more active planning at the state
level, state development agencies may be desirable to imple-
ment development plans on a broad geographical basis. To
function effectively in such a role, these agencies must have
broad powers to acquire land, to override local ordinances,
and actually to carry out development plans.

While the need for such organizations is gradually being
recognized, only New York State has actually established one.
In its first years of operation, the Urban Development Cor-
poration showed that it can be an effective mechanism, par-
ticularly for improving housing opportunities for low- and
moderate-income families. It is also committed to actively
promoting orderly urban development and is currently in-
volved in the development of several new communities
throughout the state. The early success of the Urban De-
velopment Corporation, and its promise for effectively guid-
ing orderly urban development, suggests that it would be a
good model for other states.

The Commission recommends the establishment of state
or regional development corporations which would have
the responsibility and the necessary powers to imple-
ment comprehensive development plans either as a de-
veloper itself or as a catalyst for private development.

Local

A Commission concerned with the impact of population
growth must comment upon those features of society which
make growth troublesome or not. The point applies as well to
population distribution as to growth. And the point is nowhere
better illustrated than in the effects of metropolitan growth
and expansion, occurring in the context of a fragmented struc-
ture of local government. It is obvious that this structure
makes regional problems — relating to land use, transportation,
the environment, and so forth — extremely difficult to manage,
and that, for this reason, reorganization of government in
metropolitan areas is long overdue. Moreover, given the heavy
reliance of local jurisdictions on locally collected property
taxes, the very structure of local government in metropolitan
areas influences the way population is distributed. It provides
incentives for people and activities to segregate themselves,
which produces disparities between local resources, require-
ments, and levels of service, which in turn invite further seg-
regation.

227

Perhaps the most important institutional response needed
to achieve the objectives and recommendations suggested
above is some restructuring of local governments. The number
of overlapping jurisdictions with limited functions and the
fragmentation of multi-purpose jurisdictions need to be re-
duced. The responsibility and power to serve the various needs
of the metropolitan population should be assigned to the most
appropriate level of government. Governmental organization
will vary in different locales depending upon existing govern-
mental structures, social and political traditions, urban prob-
lems, and specific objectives to be accomplished by reorganiza-
tion. In some areas, a single metropolitan-wide government
might be most appropriate. In others, a two-tier system — such
as the one in Toronto, Canada — might be most effective.
There are many ways to assign specific governmental func-
tions, services, and taxing powers within a metropolitan area.
Functions such as transportation planning and air pollution
control belong at the metropolitan level; others, such as the
operation of neighborhood health centers, may require closer
community accountability, best accomplished within smaller
jurisdictions.

The need for reorganizing local governments has been
recognized for some time, and there are signs that it is be-
ginning to occur. Increasing awareness of the metropolitan
implications of urban problems is leading to more cooperative
efforts to achieve area-wide coordination of governmental
activities. The federal government has initiated some efforts
to encourage this change, but change is slow in coming.

The Commission urges that federal and state governments
take action to rationalize the structure of local government.
This could be done through encouraging metropolitan areas
to examine the effect of their current governmental structure
and to determine ways that it might be improved. In addi-
tion, federal and state governments could establish require-
ments or incentives to encourage existing metropolitan-wide
agencies, such as councils of governments, to expand their
scope of activities, powers, and responsibilities. Or, metro-
politan areas could be required to adopt new jurisdictional
arrangements as a prerequisite for receipt of funds.

Apart from their stated objectives, governmental activities
at all levels often have unintended and contradictory effects
on population distribution. Whether building highways, guar-
anteeing mortgages, or modifying zoning and tax laws, gov-
ernment policies and actions affect population distribution and
movement and alter the intricate system of incentives that
attracts the private sector. The absence of deliberate policies

228

merely invites hidden ones whose effects may or may not be
desirable. Indeed, a 20th century de Tocqueville reviewing
these activities could easily mistake inadvertence for perverse
design.

It is imperative that public policy take serious and delib-
erate account of population distribution — the way distribution
is affected by policy, and the way it affects policy outcomes.

229

CHAPTER 15. POPULATION STATISTICS
AND RESEARCH

The content of a population policy cannot be immutable,
but will need to be adjusted over time in the light of emerging
developments, increased knowledge, and changing attitudes of
both government and the general public. Thus, the Commis-
sion sees national population policy as an evolving rather than
a static instrumentality, whose development and implementa-
tion are continuing processes. A nation must observe changes
in the number and distribution of its population, evaluate these
changes, attempt to affect them in ways that will be useful,
measure the impact of steps taken, and adapt and redefine the
issues to fit the course of the future that it seeks.

Viewed in this fashion, a policy program represents a course
of conduct that requires a continuing feedback of information
and appraisal to produce an intelligent and responsive program
as experience grows. Statistics provide the descriptive element
of the universe of policy concerns; research provides the ana-
lytical insight into causal relationships and consequences of the
phenomena that statistics reveal and measure. Both statistics
and research must underlie the formulation of policy and the
design and evaluation of programs.

Public policy in regard to population cannot be intelligently
conducted in the absence of timely statistics of high quality on
a broad range of subjects. This Commission has received ex-
cellent cooperation from the federal statistical agencies, but all
too often what they could offer was inadequate to the task.

We have reviewed the principal shortcomings in population
statistics for the United States. In doing this, we have sought

231

to anticipate statistical needs for the evolution and modification
of public policy in the field of population. We believe our
recommendations — building on the considerable strengths of
our present statistical system noted in the recent report of the
President's Commission on Federal Statistics — will provide a
sound information base for public policy in the population
field.

Our statement of information needs is conditioned by the
fact that national population policy touches every sector of the
population — geographic, ethnic, social, and economic. Since
the total effect can be obtained in many different detailed ways,
it is upon the details, rather than just upon the net result, that
the process must be appraised. The overall result is, of course,
important. It matters whether the nation's population grows
rapidly or not; but it matters, perhaps even more, what the
components of that growth are — whether changing fertility,
mortality, or migration — and where and in what groups the
changes are occurring.

The fund of information needed for such appraisal is large,
and not cheap to obtain. However, it is basically the same fund
that is essential if the entire array of government programs —
local, state, and national — are to be well-designed and well-
administered. Such programs involve the commitment of al-
most unbelievably large sums in the fields of health, welfare,
education, housing, urban planning, transportation, and the
whole gamut of economic planning. Small gains in the effi-
ciency with which such funds are ultilized would quickly more
than repay the costs of collecting and analyzing the needed
information.

Thanks to this larger significance of the nation's informa-
tion base, we have no reluctance in recommending strongly
the enrichment of our knowledge on the social and economic
side of demographic questions as we have done elsewhere on
the biomedical side. In both statistical and research programs,
we put a high priority on observance of the respondent's pri-
vacy, on the use of sampling where it can be substituted for
complete enumeration, and on the timeliness, comprehensive-
ness, and reliability of the data.

The Commission recommends that the federal government
move promptly and boldly to strengthen the basic statistics
and research upon which all sound demographic, social, and
economic policy must ultimately depend, by implementing
the following specific improvements in these programs.

232~~

VITAL STATISTICS DATA

At present, there is a minimum two-year delay in the pub-
lication of final and detailed data on births and deaths. In
spring 1972, the most recent detailed vital statistics available
were for 1968. This delay has done much to reduce the value
of the information collected because all major analyses of
trends in fertility and mortality at the national and local, socio-
economic and racial levels are dependent on these detailed
tabulations. Moreover, the detailed tabulations furnish in-
dispensable raw materials for the construction of intercensal
. estimates of the changing population of regions and localities.

Also needed is the modernization of both birth and death
certificates to improve the identification of the social, economic,
and medical situations of individuals and families and, in the
case of births, to improve the analysis of their timing by col-
lecting information about the intervals between births.

For marriage and divorce, only the number of total events
is collected from all of the states. The registration system which
provides details about the location and characteristics of the
individuals involved covers only 40 states and the District of
Columbia in the case of marriage, and 29 states in the case of
divorce. On these subjects, we have about the poorest statistics
of any advanced country.

The Commission recommends that the National Center
for Health Statistics improve the timeliness and the qual-
ity of data collected with respect to birth, death, mar-
riage, and divorce.

More particularly, the National Center for Health Statistics
should:

1. Aggressively pursue its "catch-up" program for the pro-
cessing of birth and death registration statistics, aiming at the
earliest practicable date to achieve reporting of detailed data
for each year within six months following the close of that year,
and move toward quarterly processing and reporting of these
data on a flow basis. Eventually, the same goals should be
sought for the reporting of marriage and divorce.

2. Explore the development of a system for priority sam-
pling of birth certificates on a current flow basis that would
permit the calculation and reporting of fertility rates specific

233

for age and other characteristics more promptly than is per-
mitted by even the best possible system for processing the
entire mass of data.

3. Undertake a crash program to qualify all states to par-
ticipate in the marriage and divorce registration area; to insti-
tute follow-back surveys for samples of marriages and divorces,
such as the present natality and mortality follow-back surveys;
to develop information sources on family formation and dis-
solution, and the fertility and other demographic consequences
of family dynamics.

4. Enrich our data about the social, economic, and ethnic
factors related to births, deaths, marriages, and divorces.

5. Modernize the birth and death certificates.

ENUMERATION OF SPECIAL GROUPS

Population counts are the subject of considerable contro-
versy about the correct number of blacks and persons of
Spanish origin in the population. Incomplete enumeration not
only hampers the analysis of our changing demographic situa-
tion, it also reduces the claims, especially of our poorest popu-
lations, for the many local, state, and federal programs to
which funds are allocated on the basis of population counts.

The Commission recommends that the federal govern-
ment support, even more strongly, the Census Bureau's
efforts to improve the completeness of our census enu-
meration, especially of minority groups, ghetto popula-
tions, and all unattached adults, especially males, who
are the least well counted.

INTERNATIONAL MIGRATION

Immigrants now contribute one-fifth of our annual popula-
tion growth. Yet when this Commission tried to find out what
becomes of immigrants after they arrive, what kinds of com-
munities and neighborhoods they go to, the jobs they get, the
incomes they earn, their marriage and childbearing patterns
and subsequent mortality — in other words, how immigrants
are fitting into our society and what kind of impact they have—

234

we could learn very little. Nor could we obtain any but the
crudest estimates of the number of Americans emigrating from
this country, or the coming and going of civilian citizens. And
usable figures on illegal immigration are nonexistent.

The Commission recommends that a task force be desig-
nated under the leadership of the Office of Management
and Budget to devise a program for the development of
comprehensive immigration and emigration statistics,
and to recommend ways in which the records of the
periodic alien registrations should be processed to pro-
vide information on the distribution and characteristics
of aliens in the United States.

A mid-decade census containing information on year of
immigration has a potentially large contribution to make in
this connection.

THE CURRENT POPULATION SURVEY

Jointly sponsored by the Bureau of the Census and the
Bureau of Labor Statistics and administered since the late
1930's by the Census Bureau, the monthly Current Population
Survey has developed into the nation's principal instrument
for providing information about changes in the characteristics
of the nation's population between the censuses. By reaching
a sample of some 45 to 50 thousand dwellings, it provides
precise national estimates, not only of the labor force and
employment status, but also information about the socio-
economic characteristics of households and individuals. It
also provides usable estimates for geographic divisions and for
the larger states and metropolitan regions.

Procedures should be developed to provide more precise
information on geographic location, both for the current res-
idence of those interviewed and for the prior residence of
persons who have moved. It should be possible to distinguish
with reasonable precision such categories as urban versus
rural, inside versus outside the central city, and residence
inside versus outside incorporated places.

A program of supplementary surveys, including occasional
selective supplementation of sample size, should be generated
to provide socioeconomic and other data for special groups

235

of the population, such as Spanish-Americans, and for special
types of communities whose characteristics make them impor-
tant for questions of population distribution. The survey
should also be liberally employed to ascertain trends in fertility
rates and internal migration.

The Commission recommends that the government pro-
vide substantial additional support to the Current Popu-
lation Survey to improve the area identification of those
interviewed and to permit special studies, utilizing en-
larged samples, of demographic trends in special groups
of the population.

STATISTICAL REPORTING OF FAMILY
PLANNING SERVICES

The public investment in and commitment to family plan-
ning services require the earliest possible development of a
comprehensive program of family planning statistics. As a
first step in this direction, the National Center for Health
Statistics initiated, in January 1972, a national reporting sys-
tem for family planning services provided in clinics. Coverage
includes patients receiving services supported through the
family planning project grants funded by the Department of
Health, Education and Welfare and the Office of Economic
Opportunity, and the nonfederally funded Planned Parent-
hood programs.

The national reporting system could potentially include all
patients to whom family planning services are provided. Ac-
cordingly, all government statistical programs on health ser-
vices which could provide statistics on family planning services
should do so. Only when all patient contacts are included can
truly national statistics be developed.

The National Center for Health Statistics should take the
leadership in the development of uniform statistical definitions
and standards for a coordinated federal-state-local system.

The Commission recommends the rapid development
of comprehensive statistics on family planning services.

236

NATIONAL SURVEY OF FAMILY GROWTH

Achieving a policy on population growth and implementing
the nation's commitment to family planning assistance will
require a flow of data regularly available, at comparatively
brief intervals, on factors influencing fertility, such as desired
family size, birth-spacing intentions, family planning practices,
and the home, neighborhood, and socioeconomic environment
of family growth and family-growth decisions. The feasibility
of such work has been demonstrated in a series of surveys
undertaken since 1955 by private organizations. The National
Center for Health Statistics now proposes a biennial survey
of family growth for a substantially enlarged household sam-
ple to improve the accuracy and scope of national estimates.
Funding for preparatory work has been approved, and the
National Center for Health Statistics plans to undertake the
initial survey of family growth in late 1972.

The Commission recommends program support and
continued adequate financial support for the Family
Growth Survey as almost the first condition for evalu-
ating the effectiveness of national population policies
and programs.

DISTRIBUTION OF GOVERNMENT DATA

Inevitably, formally published tabulations of governmental
data cannot begin to exhaust the information contained in
complex collections. At present, invaluable stores of informa-
tion are never used. Computer technology now makes it pos-
sible to issue identity-free tapes of such data designed to meet
the needs of particular research projects, thereby greatly mul-
tiplying the value of the stock of information, while guarding
the rights of the individuals who provided it.

The Commission recommends that the various statistical
agencies seek to maximize the public usefulness of the
basic data by making identity-free tapes available to
responsible research agencies.

237

MID-DECADE CENSUS

Our decennial censuses, together with our vital and migra-
tion statistics, provide the materials for developing quite accu-
rate annual estimates of the nation's total population classified
by age, sex, and race. They are wholly inadequate, however,
to permit the construction of annual estimates for regions,
states, and local areas, or to portray the intercensal social and
economic status of the nation's constituent populations. The
interval of 10 years between censuses — a leisurely pace estab-
lished in the 18th century — is simply too long in view of the
high mobility of our people. Under the best of circumstances,
annual local estimates will be difficult to obtain, but the prob-
lems would be greatly reduced if the intervals between the
total counts were five rather than 10 years. In addition, while
sample surveys provide national data between censuses, de-
centralized decision making at the state and local level requires
that these areas have reasonably current, detailed, quality data
about their own areas. Only a national census (incorporating
sampling principles as appropriate) can provide such data,
because it alone can provide the standardization of content,
definitions, and processing procedures which guarantee that a
statistic for one place means the same as a statistic for another
place.

The Commission recommends that the decennial census
be supplemented by a mid-decade census of the popula-
tion.

STATISTICAL USE OF ADMINISTRATIVE RECORDS

The addition of the county of residence to the information
reported on the individual income tax return, and the inclu-
sion of this entry in the taxpayer's identification file, would
materially assist in the solution of problems now encountered
by statistical agencies attempting to use taxpayer residence
changes in the estimation of internal migration. Similarly, the
Social Security Administration could greatly assist in estimat-
ing interstate and inter-area migration if its identity-deleted

238

one-percent sample of social security account holders were
increased to a 10-percent sample.

The Commission recommends that the government give
high priority to studying the ways in which federal
administrative records, notably those of the Internal
Revenue Service and Social Security Administration,
could be made more useful for developing statistical
estimates of local population and internal migration.

INTERCENSAL POPULATION ESTIMATES

Close local and federal cooperation is essential for the
construction of adequate annual estimates of population. Lo-
cal people have special access to local data, but the problems
of coordinating all the local estimates to state, regional, and
national totals must be solved at the national level. The fund
of professional experience for technical aid on methodological
problems is also best located at the national level. The Census
Bureau's program for local population estimates should be
expanded to encompass annual estimates for all congressional
districts, all metropolitan areas, and all cities and counties
having 25,000 or more inhabitants. The Census Bureau's re-
sources for developing, testing, and experimenting with im-
proved sources and methods for population estimates should
be expanded, and this support should also include resources
for gaining access to, extracting, and processing relevant in-
formation from administrative records of federal, state, or
local governments, such as tax records, school enrollment
records, and the like.

The Commission recommends that the government pro-
vide increased funding, higher priority, and accelerated
development for all phases of the Census Bureau's pro-
gram for developing improved intercensal population
estimates for states and local areas.

SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL RESEARCH

The Center for Population Research of the Department of
Health, Education and Welfare has responsibility for pro-

239

moting and guiding research in both the biomedical aspects
of reproduction and contraceptive development and in the
social and behavioral concerns of population. The Center's
role in the first area is acknowledged and reasonably well-
developed. Social and behavioral research has not been given
equal emphasis. This is perhaps because of a bias imposed by
location of the Center within the National Institutes of Health.
However, since the mandate of P.L. 91-572 includes investiga-
tion of the social and behavioral aspects of population, there
is no reason that the Center or its successor, given adequate
leadership and staff, cannot support a sufficient program in
these areas as well.

Another reason that social and behavioral research has not
been sufficient has been the general scarcity of funds for all
types of population research. In fiscal year 1972, only $6.7
million of the $39.3 million spent on population research was
devoted to behavioral aspects. Recent estimates are that federal
support for social and behavioral research in population
should be increased over the next several years to a total of
about $50 million annually.1 (See Chapter 11 for discussion
of research into methods by which individuals may control
their fertility.)

Research is needed on a broad range of topics in the
behavioral sciences to develop the knowledge required for the
formulation of population policy objectives and effective
means to achieve them. A major component of this research
must be directed toward increasing our knowledge of the
effects of population changes on the many factors that deter-
mine the quality of life in the United States, such as economic
growth, resources, environmental quality, and government
services.

Since the effects of population change are diffuse and per-
vasive, the research questions are numerous and varied. The
many gaps in our knowledge are abundantly clear in this
Report. Many others are reflected by, and indicated in, the
background papers commissioned for this Report, which will
be published in several volumes.* The following paragraphs
are intended only to illustrate the research needed.

Research on the consequences of population change must
deal not only with population size and rates of change, but
also with childbearing patterns (as reflected in ages at marriage
and parenthood, lengths of intervals between births, and so
forth), changing age composition, shifting geographic distri-
butions, changing patterns of metropolitan and nonmetro-

* A list of these papers appears in the Appendix of this Report

240

politan residence, increasing scales of social organization,
density, and the like.

Studies should not be limited to "macro" phenomena, but
should also explore the consequences of population dynamics
at the family and individual level. For example, an important
set of problems involves the immediate and long-term conse-
quences, to mothers as well as children, of births to unmarried
women. Other questions requiring investigation deal with the
effects of family size and child-spacing patterns on the health
and development of children.

The consequences of various migration patterns are of
great importance to our society. For example, how do move-
ments from rural to urban areas affect the quality of public
services available in areas of origin and destination? How do
great increases in the number of people in a jurisdiction affect
the relationship of the citizen to his local government? How
do various patterns of residential use affect the physical en-
vironment? What are the likely consequences of projected
population decline in many metropolitan areas, associated
with national population stabilization? Without answers to
many of these questions, it is difficult to formulate reasonable
policy objectives, either locally or nationally.

Also within the field of population distribution, research
is needed which more clearly differentiates the factors per-
petuating residential segregation. Racial discrimination is
clearly an important factor, for even when economic differ-
ences between races are taken into account, residential segre-
gation persists. Prejudice is not the only manifestation of racial
discrimination. There are also institutional barriers which op-
erate to keep racial minorities segregated residentially. These
barriers need to be specified and their effects understood.

Another broad area of research requiring further develop-
ment involves the determinants of population trends. Knowl-
edge of the causes of population change is needed to permit
the formulation of population policies that have a reasonable
chance of helping us to achieve our objectives. For example,
at the present time, it appears that if all couples had effective
control of their fertility, we might achieve fertility rates con-
sistent with the replacement, rather than the continued in-
crease, of our population. However, we do not know whether
current family-size preferences will change, and we know little
about what causes these preferences to change. Following
World War II, the United States, as well as a number of other
developed countries, experienced a substantial rise in fertility
after a century of decline. We understand very little about

241

why this happened, and we cannot be certain that a similar
phenomenon will not occur again.

At the family and individual level, much more needs to be
known about the factors affecting the control of fertility. We
know, for example, that strongly motivated couples can limit
their fertility with relatively ineffective contraceptive measures.
On the other hand, even when highly effective measures are
available, some couples have several unintended conceptions.
There are many theories about the factors affecting success
or failure in the control of fertility, but little solid knowledge.

An important area of research must involve the family as
a dynamic institution. Not only do specific families change
through the years, but the meaning and the functions of the
institution itself change. Since population phenomena (births,
deaths, and migration) inevitably involve the family, a major
emphasis on the family is necessary in any research on the
causes and consequences of population change. This will also
necessarily lead to research on the changing roles of women
in our society and the effects of these changes on the family
and on reproduction.

Finally, increasingly important areas of research involve
studies of the effectiveness of governmental programs and
policies that affect population change. Of major importance
now are family planning services. To what extent are they
reaching the people who need them? To what extent are they
helping couples to achieve their family-size and child-spacing
goals? Do they affect the contraceptive practices of couples
who no longer use the services offered? Beyond family plan-
ning, there are policy questions affecting fertility, migration,
and mortality. For example, to what extent do various income-
maintenance programs influence family-size and migration
patterns? How do agricultural programs affect rural-urban
population movements? How do family life education pro-
grams affect premarital sexual behavior and decisions to
marry? The questions seem varied and unlimited, but research
must begin to explore them if we are to learn how current
and future programs and policies will affect the quantity and
quality of our population.

The research needed in the social and behavioral sciences
will require the expertise of many disciplines: demography,
sociology, economics, anthropology, psychology, history, geog-
raphy, and political science. To encourage and facilitate such
research on population problems, a number of interdisciplinary
population research centers should be supported in univer-
sities and other nongovernmental centers. In fiscal year 1972,
federal support for such centers was only $1.5 million. Esti-

242

mates are that about $11.5 million should be made available
annually for this purpose within the next five years.2 With the
concerted efforts of scientists in such centers and elsewhere,
we can build a solid foundation for intelligently dealing with
population-related problems in our society.

The Commission recommends that substantial increases
in federal funds be made available for social and be-
havioral research related to population growth and
distribution, and for the support of nongovernmental
population research centers.

RESEARCH PROGRAM IN POPULATION
DISTRIBUTION

A center or sponsoring organizational unit and a funded
research program should also be developed for those studies
of population distribution needed for policy formation and
program guidance in the fields of housing, urban and economic
development, and transportation. The research program of
this center should be carefully coordinated with the program
of the Center for Population Research, which should continue
to have responsibility for the general research on questions
of population distribution and migration. The most abysmal
ignorance exists concerning the nature and effects of changes
in the population size of regions and communities in relation
to economic, social, and governmental institutions and proc-
esses, and to the physical, human, and environmental factors
of life. Yet hundreds of millions of dollars are spent on pro-
grams direcdy influencing them in the fields of transportation,
housing, and community and regional development. There is
an urgent need for the development of research capability for
understanding how population redistribution affects govern-
ment activities as well as how government programs affect
population distribution.

The Commission recommends that a research program
in population distribution be established, preferably
within the proposed Department of Community Devel-
opment, funded by a small percentage assessment on
funds appropriated for relevant federal programs.

However, the establishment of this research program should

243

not be dependent upon the creation of the Department of
Community Development. The Department of Housing and
Urban Development has requested funds to begin such a
program. We believe it should be initiated as quickly as
possible.

FEDERAL GOVERNMENT POPULATION RESEARCH

In the economic field, the federal data-collection agencies
have for years been conducting highly useful research and
analytical work that has been widely used in the development
of national policy. This is not so for federal demographic and
social statistics. Here, most data-collection agencies have re-
search programs dealing with their own techniques of col-
lecting and processing data. This is necessary but not suffi-
cient. To exploit adequately their special skills and knowledge,
these agencies should also have staff and resources devoted
to research that utilizes the data they produce and relevant
data from other sources as well. A small but successful ex-
ample is the Office of Health Statistics Analysis in the Nation-
al Center for Health Statistics. Funding should provide core
support for the agencies' own research work and for the grant
and contract funding of projects that serve to stimulate the
agencies' own work.

The Commission recommends that the federal govern-
ment foster the "in-house" research capabilities of its
own agencies to provide a coherent institutional struc-
ture for improving population research*

SUPPORT FOR PROFESSIONAL TRAINING

Finally, it should also be noted that the very large expan-
sion of research and statistical work that has already taken
place in the demographic field, not to mention that still to
come, is creating heavy demands for able and highly trained
personnel. The situation is extremely tight and inevitably will
become worse unless strong measures are taken to increase
the supply. Meanwhile, there are training facilities that sud-
denly have few students because of the curtailment of govern-

244

mental support in spite of the continuing demand. Several
years from now, if support for graduate training does not
become available, there will be an even greater shortage of
skilled personnel.

The Commission recommends that support for training
in the social and behavioral aspects of population be
exempted from the general freeze on training funds,
permitting government agencies to support programs to
train scientists specializing in this field.

245

CHAPTER 16. ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGES

A paradox exists within the federal government with regard
to population. Although many departments and agencies ad-
minister programs which influence and are influenced by
population growth and distribution, these subjects have not,
until very recently, been of specific concern to either the
executive or legislative branches. This Commission has made
a number of recommendations directed toward: (1) increas-
ing public knowledge of the causes and consequences of
population change; (2) facilitating and guiding the processes
of population movement; (3) maximizing information about
human reproduction and its consequences for the family; and
(4) enabling individuals to avoid unwanted fertility.

Many of these recommendations require governmental
action, and some can be carried out by existing structures.
But, in many cases, the recommendations illustrate the need
for changes in governmental structure in order to acknowl-
edge and deal with population issues, and to conduct research,
develop policy, and administer programs more effectively.
In addition, legislative review of population-related programs
needs to be improved. We believe that both the executive-
and legislative branches of the federal government must give
greater attention to population-related issues and programs.

The Commission recommends that organizational changes
be undertaken to improve the federal government's capacity
to develop and implement population-related programs; and
to evaluate the interaction between public policies, programs,
and population trends.

247

OFFICE OF POPULATION AFFAIRS, DEPARTMENT
OF HEALTH, EDUCATION AND WELFARE

The Department of Health, Education and Welfare was the
first federal agency to begin giving serious attention to popu-
lation-related problems and is the major locus for both family
planning services and population research. In 1967, the Sec-
retary appointed a Deputy Assistant Secretary for Population
and Family Planning. Subsequently, the title was changed to
Deputy Assistant Secretary of Population Affairs. P.L. 91-572,
passed in 1970, requires the Deputy Assistant Secretary to
administer all family planning service and population research
programs of the Department, provide and support training
of personnel, serve as a clearinghouse for information, provide
liaison with other agencies of the federal government that have
responsibilities relating to family planning services and popu-
lation research, and coordinate other Department of Health,
Education and Welfare programs that relate to these fields.

During consideration of P.L. 91-572, the Department an-
nounced that, in addition to the proposed statutory powers,
the Deputy Assistant Secretary would have line authority
over the contraceptive evaluation program of the Food and
Drug Administration, responsibility for preparation and pre-
sentation of budgets for family planning services and popu-
lation research, and adequate staff to carry out his responsi-
bilities. This authority would be exercised through two offi-
cials selected by the Deputy Assistant Secretary and who
would have dual appointments within the Department. One
would be named as an Assistant Director of the National
Institutes of Health for Population Research, and the other
as an Assistant Administrator of the Health Services and
Mental Health Administration for Family Planning Services.
Both would also serve as special assistants to the Deputy As-
sistant Secretary. Most of these arrangements have not yet been
carried out.

Recently, the Secretary of the Department of Health, Edu-
cation and Welfare gave the Deputy Assistant Secretary for
Population Affairs overall departmental responsibility for
coordinating population education. As yet, however, there is
no staff and only a small budget has been requested to cany
out this program.

We believe that creation of the position of Deputy Assistant

248

Secretary and the Office of Population Affairs was a step to-
ward giving population-related programs in the Department
the overall direction and coordination which they need. Al-
though there has been some progress in this direction, it has
been limited by failure to carry through on the specified ar-
rangements.

We recommend that the capacity of the Department of
Health, Education and Welfare in the population field
be substantially increased by strengthening the Office of
Population Affairs and expanding its staff in order to
augment its role of leadership within the Department.

NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF
POPULATION SCIENCES

As we noted earlier, the financial commitment to popula-
tion research is not sufficient to deal with the problems pre-
sented. The Commission believes that the institutional frame-
work for the population research program is also inadequate.

The primary focus of the federal population research pro-
gram is the Center for Population Research — an operating
unit of the National Institute of Child Health and Human
Development. The Center supports research in the develop-
ment of new contraceptives, the medical effects of existing
methods of fertility control, and the social and behavioral
aspects of population change. Although creation of the Cen-
ter was a worthwhile development in 1968 when the govern-
ment was first beginning to acknowledge the need for popula-
tion research, the program has now outgrown this organiza-
tional arrangement.

In addition to population research, the National Institute of
Child Health and Human Development houses research pro-
grams in aging and early childhood development. Both of
these are important fields, requiring significant research ef-
forts, but population research has been growing at a much
faster rate than the other two programs. This results in two
problems. First, advocates of research in aging and early child-
hood development believe that population research is being
advanced at the expense of their programs. Second, adminis-
trators of the Institute have felt it necessary to maintain some
balance among its programs. This appears to be at least part
of the reason why population research has not been funded

249

at its authorized levels. If all of the funds recommended by
this Commission for population research in fiscal year 1973
were approved, it would be funded at a level greater than the
other programs combined. It is apparent that the additional
large increases recommended by the Commission for ensuing
years will be difficult if not impossible to achieve under the
present arrangement. All three areas of research — aging, early
childhood development, and population research — could bene-
fit from moving the population research program from the
National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.

A greatly expanded and more focused population research
effort is needed. In addition to strengthening programs in
basic and applied reproductive research and evaluation of
contraceptives, the behavioral research program must be sig-
nificantly enlarged. In addition, the population research pro-
gram must have the prestige to attract the very best investi-
gators.

Creation of a separate institute should provide a stronger
base from which this increased effort can be directed. It would
facilitate acquisition of qualified personnel, laboratory and
clinical space, and other resources necessary for a diversified
research program. It would increase the visibility of the popu-
lation research program, signal to the world that it ranks high
among our research priorities, and should help in commanding
the level of funding that we believe is necessary but which has
not been forthcoming.

We therefore recommend the establishment, within the
National Institutes of Health, of a National Institute of
Population Sciences to provide an adequate institutional
framework for implementing a greatly expanded pro*
gram of population research.

DEPARTMENT OF COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT

Programs affecting population distribution are scattered
throughout the government. For example, the problems of
growth and development of urban, suburban, and rural com-
munities are closely related but, depending on their size, com-
munities that seek help for planning and constructing public
facilities must deal with one or more of three different de-
partments that support these activities.

We believe it is necessary to make organizational changes

250

to coordinate and, in some cases, consolidate existing urban
and rural development programs and provide a locus for the
studies of population growth and distribution necessary for
policy development and program implementation in the areas
of housing, economic development, transportation, and other
related fields.

Congress is currently considering legislation that would
establish a new Department of Community Development.*
Under this proposed reorganization, a single federal depart-
ment would administer the major programs of assistance for
the physical and institutional development of communities —
for planning and building houses, for supporting public facili-
ties and highways, and for strengthening state and local gov-
ernmental processes. Among the programs which the reor-
ganization would move to this Department would be all of the
programs of the Department of Housing and Urban De-
velopment (except for the college housing program); the
highway construction and mass transit programs of the De-
partment of Transportation; the rural electrification, public
facilities, and housing programs of the Department of Agri-
culture; the programs of financial and planning assistance
for public works and development facilities (except business
development) of the Economic Development Administration
of the Department of Commerce, and that Department's
Regional Action Planning Commissions; and the Community
Action and "special impact" programs of the Office of Eco-
nomic Opportunity.

This proposal is one of four submitted by President Nixon
for reorganization of the federal departments. Each of them
raises a great number of issues that are not our concern and
on which we are not qualified to comment. However, from the
perspective of better facilitating and guiding population dis-
tribution, coordination and consolidation of urban and rural
development programs is essential. The proposal for the
Department of Community Development does not include
a specific provision for the increased research in population
growth and distribution which we feel is necessary for ade-
quate policy formulation and program development within
its areas of concern. This should be provided for in the new
Department.

We therefore recommend that Congress adopt legisla-
tion to establish a Department of Community Develop-

* A separate statement by Commissioner Alan Cranston appears on
page 273.

251

merit and that this Department undertake a program of
research on the interactions of population growth and
distribution and the programs it administers.

There are other functions necessary to the formulation of
a coherent national development policy which we believe
cannot be handled adequately at the departmental level, but
require a higher level of authority and perspective. These are
discussed in the next section.

OFFICE OF POPULATION GROWTH
AND DISTRIBUTION

Our government has no explicit population policy. Federal
programs generally operate without regard to their effects upon
population growth and distribution or how shifts in population
patterns affect programs. The Commission believes that popu-
lation-related factors must be given much more weight in the
future development and implementation of a variety of federal
policies and programs. Moreover, the content of a population
policy would not be inflexible, but would need to be adjusted
over time in the light of emerging developments, increased
knowledge, and changing attitudes of both policy makers and
the general public. To accomplish this requires much more
than strengthening the Office of Population Affairs within the
Department of Health, Education and Welfare or establishing
a Department of Community Development. What is needed
is an organizational unit with the ability to take the broadest
possible view of population issues, to transcend individual de-
partmental points of view, and to develop and formulate co-
herent population policies. This can be done most effectively
from the Executive Office of the President which is able to
coordinate the activities of all departments. This new office
should:

Establish objectives and criteria for shaping national
growth and distribution policies.

Monitor, anticipate, and appraise the effects on popula-
tion of all governmental activities — including health, edu-
cation, and welfare programs; urban and rural develop-
ment programs; defense procurement policies; and tax
laws — and the effect that population growth and dis-

252

tribution will have on the implementation of all govern-
mental programs.

Provide for the review, integration, and coordination of
population programs, giving consideration to the role
played by nongovernmental resources and institutions.

Assume responsibility for preparation and submission of
the biennial Report on Urban Growth required by the
Housing Act of 1970.

Assist state and other units of government concerned
about population matters in dealing with their problems.

In order to carry out effectively the monitoring of federal
policies for their effect upon growth and distribution, the office
should have the power to require, from federal agencies, state-
ments indicating that an agency has given consideration to
possible population-related effects of proposed programs and
how programs in operation have affected population growth
and distribution.

The Office should report to the President and the Congress
annually. There should be an Advisory Committee composed
of experts in various population-related fields, representatives
of interested groups, and other citizens. It is essential that such
an office be provided with the staff and funds necessary to carry
out this range of activities. To create an office within the Exec-
utive Office of the President, and then require it to rely upon
staff work from other federal agencies would hinder drastically
the development of the broad and impartial perspective that is
needed.

We therefore recommend the creation of an Office of
Population Growth and Distribution within the Execu-
tive Office of the President.

There are a number of advisory bodies within the Executive
Office of the President that have broad reponsibilities over
other areas of concern. These agencies have not, in the past,
given sufficient consideration to the effects of demographic
variables on the nation's economic, social, environmental, and
scientific life.

We therefore recommend the immediate addition of
personnel with demographic expertise to the staffs of
the Council of Economic Advisers, the Domestic Coun-

253

cil, the Council on Environmental Quality, and the
Office of Science and Technology.

COUNCIL OF SOCIAL ADVISORS

Two years of study and deliberation have demonstrated to
us that population is intimately tied to numerous social issues.
Yet, innumerable social programs are undertaken by the gov-
ernment each year without having any of the overall direction
that we have imposed upon our economic and environmental
activities. The Council of Economic Advisers and the Council
on Environmental Quality keep the President and the public
informed of the effects of public needs and policies with regard
to the economy and the environment and recommend pro-
grams to assist economic growth and stability and to preserve
the environment. The Commission believes that population and
related social matters require the same level of attention.

We therefore recommend that Congress approve pendr
ing legislation establishing a Council of Social Advisers
and that this Council have as one of its main functions
the monitoring of demographic variables.

If this legislation is passed, if the Council is adequately
funded and staffed, and if it shows that it will give proper
consideration to population problems, then it could and
should take over the functions and role of the Office of Popu-
lation Growth and Distribution.

JOINT COMMITTEE ON POPULATION

Congress has been the arm of government most interested
in population problems. It was the hearings conducted by Sen-
ator Gruening, beginning in 1965, that first focused public at-
tention on the need for federally subsidized family planning
and population research programs. The urban growth policy
provisions of the Housing Act of 1970 were a congressional
initiative, and several bills urging the establishment of a
Commission on Population were introduced in Congress as
early as 1967.

254

However, jurisdiction over population-related programs is
scattered among many committees of Congress. The P.L.
91-572 family planning services and population research pro-
grams are within the purview of the Interstate and Foreign
Commerce Committee of the House of Representatives. But
family planning services authorized by the Social Security
Act and the Economic Opportunity Act fall under the jurisdic-
tion of the Ways and Means and the Education and Labor
Committees respectively. Housing legislation is handled by
the banking committees of the House and Senate, while trans-
portation is the concern of the commerce committees. It is
impossible to combine jurisdiction over the many issues re-
lating to population under one committee. However, if con-
gressional review of population matters is to be most effec-
tive, some focal point within Congress is necessary. One com-
mittee should have responsibility for studying issues from
the perspective of their effect upon population growth and dis-
tribution, for spotlighting problems, and for reviewing the im-
plementation of federal programs in these areas.

In order to provide improved legislative oversight of
population issues^ the Commission recommends that
Congress assign to a joint committee responsibility for
specific review of this area.

STATE POPULATION AGENCIES
AND COMMISSIONS

Many of the recommendations of this Commission require
action by state and local governments. However, only a few
states have agencies which give serious attention to the prob-
lems of population growth and distribution. One example of
high-level attention to state population problems is the recent
report and recommendations of the California State Assembly
Science and Technology Advisory Council.

Only one state, Hawaii, has established a population agency,
and it is temporary. A poll conducted by the State of Hawaii
Commission on Population Stabilization showed that 22 states
have no specific agency concerned with these problems. In
most of the remaining states, population is the concern of plan-
ning, resource, or environmental agencies. However, in re-
sponding to the Hawaii poll, 27 states indicated that they con-
sidered population growth a problem; four states viewed popu-

255

lation loss as a problem; and 12 states responded that
distribution is a problem, including six which define the prob-
lem as one of both growth and distribution. Forty-one states
reported that they would like to meet with representatives of
other states to discuss population and what might be done at
federal and state levels to influence growth. This interest and
concern should be stimulated.

The Commission recommends that state governments,
either through existing planning agencies or through
new agencies devoted to this purpose, give greater
attention to the problems of population growth and
distribution*

PRIVATE EFFORTS AND POPULATION POLICY

We have taken the position that population growth, size,
and distribution are too important to be left to chance in the
formation of public policy, and that they require a continuing
and conscious effort by government to assess the demographic
impacts of alternative policy proposals. We believe that popu-
lation problems are complex, that they are and will continue
to be of critical importance to American society, that we are
only in the beginning stages of learning how to deal with
these problems as a matter of conscious policy and program-
ming, and that these problems will require sustained attention
over a period of years.

To maximize the government's ability to cope with popula-
tion issues requires that the private sector use its independence
and flexibility to facilitate policy formation. This may be done
through policy-oriented research and analysis, monitoring and
assessing change, education and training, and communication
of the results of these processes to relevant publics. The pri-
vate institutions which currently have some relationship to
population policy include universities, voluntary and profes-
sional organizations, citizens groups, private corporations, and
private foundations. The normal interests of these institutions,
individually or collectively, do not presently ensure an ade-
quate overall private effort.

For example, the normal interests of discipline-oriented aca-
demic institutions do not necessarily assign priority to studies
essential to policy formation. Even when academic research
produces findings directly relevant to policy formation, they

256

are often not made available in forms which are understand-
able to and usable by policy makers. Many critical policy-
related studies in the last decade did not emerge as planned
products of the academic research on which they were based,
but rather as a result of reanalyses stimulated by groups closer
to the policy-formation process.

Similarly, universities and other institutions which have as
their primary focus the population problems of developing
countries do not have the funds and personnel to be effective
in policy formation at home. Domestic population questions
are complex enough to require full-time concentration and
commitment, free of pressure from other priorities.

This concept of private support for research and policy
development has been utilized to deal with other issues. For
example, several independent organizations are devoted
to research, education, and publication in the field of economic
policy. Among their purposes are aiding the development of
sound public policies and promoting public understanding of
issues of national importance. There is no reason to specify an
exact organizational model for activity required in the popu-
lation field, but we are at a stage of development in this area
where major privately funded activities in development of
population policy are required.

We therefore recommend that a substantially greater
effort focusing on policy-oriented research and analysis
of population in the United States be carried forward
through appropriate private resources and agencies.

257

SEPARATE STATEMENTS

Separate Statement of Marilyn Brant Chandler

Beyond my own personal feelings, I oppose open abortion
on demand and support limited therapeutic abortion laws for
the following reasons:

1. The Commission report does stress that abortion should
not be a substitute for birth control, but has not intimated
that liberal abortion takes the responsibility away from sexual
activity. Impulsive, irresponsible sexual involvement can be
rationalized without fear of pregnancy if abortion is open,
legal, and free.

2. My pragmatic feeling is that the United States is not
ready for abortion on demand because:

Government agencies and politicians shy away from the
issue.

Fifty states have 50 differing laws, though this is wrong,
for laws should be uniform across the nation. These dif-
fering laws will take a long time to change. States will
adopt a therapeutic law before adopting an open law.

Abortion is still a major moral issue.

Our Commission's public opinion poll indicates that,
though 50 percent were pro-abortion on a patient-to-
doctor relationship, the other half approves it not at all
or half-heartedly.

Title X of the Public Health Service Act and the Eco-
nomic Opportunity Family Planning Act will not fund or
support abortion.

Conflicting state and federal court interpretations on
the legal right of a fetus will not be resolved until a na-
tionwide law or court decision is passed.

Until public opinion conclusively fights the strong groups
opposing open abortion, the American Law Institute model
presents a more acceptable alternative than open abortion.

261

This model, admittedly, has deficiencies in defining the mental
health of a woman or in its egalitarian selection. However, I
advocate therapeutic abortion on the basis that: (1) abortion
is a decision between woman and physician; (2) it is approved
by a hospital committee; (3) it is performed in a hospital or
accredited clinic; and (4) the limit for the gestation period
does not exceed 18 weeks.

262

Separate Statements of Paul B. Comely, M.D.

Legal Impediments for Minors

The recommendation that contraceptive information and
services be made available to minors is indeed objectionable
when it is applied to all minors. There is no question that this
should be so in reference to those who are acknowledged to
be emancipated minors, such as married teenagers or self-
supported ones who may be living within or outside their
parents' home. In this instance, the same guidelines and safe-
guards which have been noted for family planning services
should apply. It should be voluntary, with due consideration
given to the religious beliefs and culture of the individual;
supporting services such as counseling and social service
should be available; emphasis on privacy, consideration and
the dignity of the individual should be always present; and
there should be ease of accessibility for everyone.

On the other hand, when we as a society accept the respon-
sibility of giving contraceptive advice and services to those
who are minors living in a family unit, then we are striking
at the foundation and roots of family life, which are already
weakened by our misuse of affluence and technology. First of
all, it should be stated that the age of menarche or beginning
of menstruation is continually going downwards, so that today
it is about 12.5 years. The implications of this are indeed
obvious and need not be belabored. What is of greater im-
portance is that our society has the responsibility to provide
the kind of family life, education, neighborhood, recreational
facilities, and creative outlets which would make it possible
for all minors to live in an environment which would be
conducive to the growth and development of the child which
is due him. If this affluent society cannot do this, then it has
failed miserably and does not deserve to continue to exist.

* See also concurrence with statement of Commissioner Otis Dudley
Duncan on pages 274-275.

263

Contraceptive approach to minors is the cheapest and most
irresponsible way for our society to solve this problem.

Abortion

The majority's recommendation that a nationwide abortion-
on-demand law modeled after the New York State statute be
adopted cannot be supported. Abortion in the opinion of this
Commissioner is destruction of human life since it kills the
fetus; and society through its laws has a responsibility to pro-
tect all human life. Support for this concern can best be ex-
pressed by discussing some of the issues raised in this section.

The Law: The argumentative posture of these paragraphs
is exclusively that of the pro-abortionists, namely, that abor-
tion legislation has been no more than a health measure pos-
tulated on the welfare of the mother only. This section of the
report does not even make an attempt to provide a legal
accounting for the unborn developing child.

The Moral Question: This section of the report proposes
that only one moral principle be the controlling factor in the
abortion situation: the woman's freedom to reproduce. Such
moralistic monism, simplistic as it is, at bottom fails to con-
sider the freedom of the unborn child to live. Overall, the
arguments of this section would make some sense if the topic
was a woman's right to use preventive contraceptive methods.

For all its language about moral sensitivities, the text seems
completely oblivious of the fact, much less the implications,
of defining a segment of humanity as "unwanted." The Com-
mission does not face the question: What does it mean as
public policy to legitimate the destruction of "unwanted
children"?

Public Health: The report overrates the problems of illegal
abortions as much as it overrates the feasibility of unrestricted
abortion laws to solve what problems there really are. Most
of the data cited in this section of the report come from New
York City, and are based on a limited experience. This is
concerned almost exclusively with the short-range effects of
abortion on the mother's health (at that, there is no way of
following up on the out-of-staters). The data from Russia,
Eastern Europe, and Japan on the negative long-range effects
of abortion on a woman's reproductive system are ignored.

It also should be noted that the overall maternal death rate,
even with the presence of restrictive abortion laws, has been
steadily declining for years. The role of positive maternal
health care has been overlooked.

264

The complete failure to consider even the massive destruc-
tion of developing fetal life as some kind of balancing factor
in public health is but an indictment of the myopic point of
view of this section.

Family Planning: The report ignores the evidence in Eng-
land, Japan, and the Eastern European countries that the
easy availability of abortion destroys motivation to have con-
sistent recourse to preventive contraception methods. As the
text reads, the Commission would be saying that it believes
that the transition from the abortion mentality to the pre-
ventive contraceptive mentality could be achieved by the sim-
ple presence of adequate contraceptive technology. If such
would be the case, this would be the first time in human his-
tory that technology has ever solved a specifically human
problem. This faith in technology is hardly justified, either
historically as regards technology or specifically as regards
family planning.

Demographic Context: It is highly ironic that a Commis-
sion concerned with population policy should settle for the
kind of scattered information that is available regarding the
demographic impact of abortion, yet would recommend un-
restricted abortion as public policy. In this section, the Com-
mission, practically writes off the demographic impact of
abortion as a significant issue for the United States.

Population Stabilization

This Commissioner is one who identifies with the third
position in Chapter 1 and firmly believes that population
growth is indeed not the major problem in our society and
that, of more import, is the need for a radical rearrangement
of our values and priorities as well as the relationship of man
to himself, of men to each other, and to the earth from which
we sprang. As Rene Dubos stated in a speech which he made
before the Smithsonian Institution on October 2, 1969, en-
titled 'Theology of the Earth," the first chapter of Genesis
tells man and woman to replenish the earth and subdue it;
but of more importance is the second chapter wherein man
is instructed to dress and keep the land. This means that man
must be concerned with what happens to the land and its
resources.

It is of particular importance to keep this in mind because,
many times throughout the Report of the Commission, the
need to speak in terms of statistics about people, rather than
about people themselves, may leave the impression that

265

human beings are looked upon as things or chattel which can
be equated in terms of numbers or quantities; what it costs
to produce them; what is the supply and demand; and how
they can be moved or rearranged.

This then brings me to the recommendation of this chapter
on population stabilization. 1 voted for it, but I would not
want anyone to believe that the phrase, "the Commission
recommends that the nation welcome and plan for a stabilized
population," is intended to mean that I would support any
national or state governmental policy or regulation which
would in any way interfere with the desires, aspirations, and
needs of any family concerning its size or number. For our
government to interfere with this sacred trust given to each
family would be to bring Orwell's 1984 prediction closer to
reality. My intent is expressed by the following statement of
goals by the Commission: . . . creating social conditions
wherein the desired values of individuals, families, and com-
munities can be realized; equalizing social and economic op-
portunities for women and members of disadvantaged minori-
ties; and enhancing the potential for improving the quality of
life.

266

Separate Statements of Alan Cranston

I agree with most of the views expressed in the final ver-
sion of the Commission Report. Many of my early concerns
over specific portions of prior drafts were eliminated in
later revisions. But, as with the other Commissioners, my
concurrence in this Report should not be interpreted as mean-
ing that I necessarily agree with every statement or always
with the wording chosen. I do want to make the following
comments on the views expressed by the Commission on a
few specific substantive points.

Resources and the Environment

I agree with the conclusion reached in this chapter that a
lessening of population growth will buy us some time in the
struggle to maintain a livable biosphere. The Commission's
mandate was to study the effect of population growth on our
environment and natural resources, and the models on which
its studies were based emphasize the population factor. Those
reading the Report should keep this in mind.

The Report argues that continued population growth in-
evitably speeds up the depletion of natural resources and
requires rapid technological development — to meet the ever-
increasing demand for goods and services — all of which in-
creases environmental pollution.

Proceeding from this assumption, the Report attempts to
show the impact of population on the environment by "using
a quantitative model which shows the demand for resources
and the pollution levels associated with different rates of
economic and population growth." If the Commission's use
of this quantitative model — appropriate for the Commission's
function — were to be misunderstood, unintended and un-
justified conclusions could be drawn from it about the Com-
mission's view of the relationship between population growth
and environmental degradation.

This bears clarification, for, in The Closing Circle, Barry

267

Commoner comments on the danger of this kind of approach
to the environmental problem:

This approach, it seems to me, is equivalent to attempt-
ing to save a leaking ship by lightening the load and
forcing passengers overboard. One is constrained to ask
if there isn't something radically wrong with the ship.

His point is well taken.

Population pressures did not lead soap manufacturers to
switch to detergents.

Population pressures did not lead farmers to the use of
pesticides and chemical fertilizers.

Population pressures did not lead our cities to the abandon-
ment of public transit systems nor to our public's dependence
on the private automobile.

Population pressures did not develop the too-big and too-
powerful American automobile.

Population pressures did not bring about the switch to
flip-top beer cans and nonreturnable bottles.

Population pressures did not fill our homes with myriad
electrical gadgets.

Most of our environmental disasters have been the tech-
nological successes of an economic system where the goal
is to use technology to maximize profit.

The ecologically unsound technological developments of
the past two decades would have created the environmental
crisis even if the population had been stable during that period.

The final few pages of Chapter 4 tend to balance out the
preceding emphasis on population as the cause of environ-
mental deterioration. However, the Report states that: "Popu-
lation growth is clearly not the sole culprit in ecological dam-
age." I would like to point out the population growth is not
the major culprit, either. The major culprit is the manner in
which we use, control, and evaluate our technology.

Slowing population growth will give us time to reevaluate
and change our technology, but it cannot substitute for the
changes which must be made if we are to survive.

Population Education

The Commission recommends enactment of a Population
Education Act and presents a persuasive case for a greatly
enlarged federal effort. I was the Senate author of both pro-
visions in the present law cited by the Commission dealing

268

with federal assistance in the development and implementa-
tion of population education programs, materials, and curri-
cula— in the Family Planning Services and Population Re-
search Act (P.L. 91-572) and in the Environmental Educa-
tion Act of 1970 (P.L. 91-516). As Chairman of the Special
Subcommittee on Human Resources of the Senate Labor and
Public Welfare Committee, I also conducted oversight hear-
ings on the Administration's failure to implement these pro-
grams.

But I am not at present certain in my own mind whether
it would be more appropriate to achieve our ends legislatively
by amending existing laws or by enacting an entirely new
statute.

Legal Impediments for Minors

The Commission recommends the elimination of legal bar-
riers to, and the establishment of, programs for the distribu-
tion of contraceptive information and services to all, includ-
ing unmarried teenagers. I support fully the Commission's
purpose: to eliminate the suffering which an unwanted birth
often produces both for mother and child. The means of im-
plementing the Commission's recommendation that such in-
formation and services should be provided without parental
consent to unmarried teenagers living in the home concern
me, however.

I do not believe the Commission has placed sufficient stress
on the role and responsibilities of parents regarding the pro-
vision of birth control information and services. Although I
believe appropriate discussion of reproduction, birth control,
and venereal disease should be included in the basic school
curriculum for adolescents, I also believe it would be a mis-
take to place our principal emphasis on that method of edu-
cation. Society and schools should make every effort to en-
courage child and parent to discuss these matters honestly
and openly. Our educational programs should stress this.

I have similar concerns about medical authorities providing
contraceptive services to unemancipated teenagers without
parental consent or knowledge. I strongly believe that it should
be the obligation of the health professional to counsel the
unemancipated teenage patient to raise this issue with his or
her parents. Nonetheless, despite my serious concerns on this
question, I concur that it is poor public policy for pregnancy
to be treated as a kind of moralistic punishment for what some
may consider promiscuous sexual behavior.

269

Abortion

Although the Commission expresses strong concern — which
I share fully — over the danger that abortion may be used as
a means of birth control, the Commission also recommends
the adoption of state laws permitting abortion upon a preg-
nant woman's request, provided it is performed by licensed
physicians under conditions of medical safety.

I am unable to join in this recommendation because I hesi-
tate to endorse governmental sanction of the destruction of
what many people consider to be human life. I am par-
ticularly concerned by the social and ethical implications of
such action now, given the general atmosphere of violence
and callousness toward life in our society and in our world.
Ours has become an incredibly violent time. Our people are
involved in acts of violence both in our streets and in South-
east Asia. Meanwhile all mankind exists under the dark
shadow of the strategy of nuclear terror with its threat of
sudden death for all of us.

Has life ever been held more cheaply? Has there ever been
greater indifference to the taking of life? Are we really aware
of just how hardened we have become?

I wonder if, in this atmosphere, we are capable of making
a wise decision on this issue involving our very attitude toward
human life. Perhaps we should wait for a more compassionate
and less callous time.

I want to make it plain that I recognize the inconsistencies
and inequities involved in many existing state laws permitting
abortions for "therapeutic" reasons. They have the effect of
depriving low-income persons of equal access to medical
procedures readily available to the more affluent. Such laws,
along with the even more restrictive or prohibitive laws in
some states, result in utter tragedy for women who, unable
to afford travel to another state or abroad to obtain an abor-
tion, turn in desperation to illegal abortions and suffer butch-
ery that often destroys both the fetus and the mother.

I understand and respect the view that many people hold
that abortion is fundamentally a question of a woman's in-
herent right to control her own body. But I also understand
and respect the view of many others that a second body also
is involved — a human fetus. And, as I have indicated, I am
concerned about the effect of all this on still a third body —
our society itself.

270

Illegal Aliens

The Commission recommends that Congress enact legisla-
tion to impose civil and criminal sanctions on employers of
illegal border crossers or aliens who are in an immigration
status which does not authorize employment. Such a statute
would, in my judgment, impose on employers an onerous bur-
den of having to ascertain in fact whether each individual is in
a proscribed category. This could very well have a chilling
effect on hiring in international border areas, thereby serious-
ly jeopardizing employment opportunities for Mexican-
Americans.

Only in the case of an employer who knows or has clear
reason to know that an employee is within a proscribed cate-
gory would I favor imposition of any criminal or civil penalty.

One burden I would place on the employer is that he in-
quire about the citizenship of each prospective employee.
If the applicant states he is an alien, the employer should re-
quire submission of evidence of lawful admission for per-
manent residence or of authorized employment status. (I note
that section 14 of S. 1373, currently pending before the Senate
Committee on the Judiciary, contains such a provision. Also,
a law recently enacted in California as section 2805 of the
Labor Code penalizes employers who deprive lawful resi-
dents of jobs by knowingly hiring illegal aliens.)

I think we need to find better ways of halting the employ-
ment of illegal aliens, while at the same time not imposing
onerous or counterproductive burdens or restraints on em-
ployers. Two that I am considering are:

1. Requiring that Social Security cards issued to aliens be
of a different color, or in some way clearly distinguishable,
from those issued to citizens. (We would need to make sure,
however, that citizens are not unreasonably put to great trou-
ble in producing evidence of citizenship in order to secure
a Social Security card.)

2. Requiring each prospective employee to complete a non-
notarized affidavit form regarding his or her United States
citizenship. Material false statements would be punishable
under the Federal False Statements Act.

It is important that in coping with the employment of illegal
aliens, we consult with those population groups most directly
affected. It is equally important that we do not choose a
remedy that imposes special burdens on any geographical,
ethnic, or racial group.

271

Depressed Rural Areas

In discussing the goals of our population policy as it re-
lates to migration and economically depressed rural areas,
concepts such as population maldistribution and the need for
population dispersion take on real meaning only after careful
analysis of the economic and social consequences of the
changing structure of the agricultural industry. However, I
wish to make certain observations about what causes people
to leave rural America.

Of the 5.5 million individual farms that existed in 1950,
only 2.9 million remain today. If present trends continue,
there will be fewer than two million farms in 1980. In other
words, 900,000 farms will disappear in the span of just eight
years. Some 900,000 farm families will be forced to seek
their livings outside of farming — often in already overcrowded
urban centers where they are ill-equipped to compete in a
job market that requires skills and training unacquired in
rural life.

The structure of modern agriculture is changing dramati-
cally. Twenty to 30 years ago, the rural landscape was dotted
with family farms and small, thriving communities. Today,
small farmers are being blown off their land by the winds of
economic and technological change. Farms are increasingly
large-scale and mechanized; the farming industry is increas-
ingly dominated by giant corporations and conglomerates that
buy up prime farmland and seek the total vertical integration
of the industry from "seedling to supermarket." The pro-
duction, processing, marketing, and distribution of agricul-
tural commodities are increasingly controlled by huge cor-
porate entities that have little, if any, stake in the rural com-
munity. With an economic base that is primarily urban, these
agri-industries siphon off what few economic resources are
left in rural America.

The Commission's statement that "many places have simply
outlived their economic function" could be interpreted as an
acceptance of the myth of the inevitability of bigness of agri-
culture. The unfortunate reality is that corporations and con-
glomerates are moving into farming not because smaller units
are inefficient, but because present federal policies are en-
couraging these entities to diversify into agriculture by pro-
viding them with tax benefits and other economic incentives.
Their presence in agriculture — and the nonfarm resources
they control — make it virtually impossible for the indepen-

272

dent farmer to compete successfully, even though he is likely
to be the more efficient farmer.

If we are to discuss maximizing freedom of choice about
where an individual wants to live and work — and I believe
such freedom is essential — we must make it possible for the
independent farmers and businessmen of rural America to
survive economically. As the Commission notes, we must
build up the economic and social base for the maintenance
of rural communities so that people have a real choice about
where to live and to work. We must also resist the temptation
to assume that we can revitalize rural America only by bring-
ing in new industry. Although rural communities desperately
need infusion of new capital, industrialization alone will not
provide jobs and economic stability there in a manner con-
sistent with environmental and social quality.

It is vital that we examine these issues in more detail if
we are to develop and implement viable national policies and
priorities that can achieve a better rural/urban population
balance.

Department of Community Development

The Commission recommends that Congress enact legisla-
tion to establish a Department of Community Development
to undertake, among other things, research on the interactions
between population growth and distribution, and the pro-
grams such a Department would administer. I agree that this
research is necessary. An administration bill, S. 1618, to estab-
lish such a Department, is pending before the Senate Com-
mittee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, of which I am
a member. But until I am able to resolve all the difficult
issues involved in creating this super-Department — including
the implications of removing the community action program
from the Office of Economic Opportunity — I believe it would
be premature for me, as a member of the authorizing com-
mittee, to join in this Commission recommendation.

273

Separate Statement of Otis Dudley Duncan,
concurred in by Paul B. Comely, M.D.

We inquire what is the effect of a growing population on a
"healthy economy." But the majority of the Commission, no
doubt wisely, did not care to inquire into what may constitute
"health" in regard to an economy. We accept projections to
the effect that, three decades hence, "the average individual's
consumption is expected to be more than twice what it is today"
without inquiring whether a doubling of consumption every
30 years be a sign of "health," or, perchance, of some disease
whose horrors will only be disclosed to us by degrees. The
Commission cannot plead that the proper questions were not
raised before it, for they are trenchantly stated in the paper,
"Declining Population Growth: Economic Effects," prepared
for the Commission by J. J. Spengler. I wish to conclude this
statement with a quotation from Spengler's paper:

Today it is assumed that the economic circle can be
squared; for ... it is supposed that a society may have
guaranteed full employment, price-level stability, strong
producer pressure groups (trade unions, business and agri-
cultural groups, government employees), and freedom
from direct economic controls. In reality, of course, it
is impossible for these four objectives to be realized simul-
taneously; only two, possibly three, are compatible. The
policies driving the American economy are much more
directionless than those which animate the Strassburg
goose and the Sumo wrestler to eat continuously, the one
to become liver pate and the other to "belly" one of his
kind from the ring; for this economy, with its momen-
tum based upon destruction of a finite earth's depleting
resources, neglects the fundamental requirement for sur-
vival, namely, conducting its affairs in keeping with an
infinite time or planning horizon.

Ultimately, attainability of a population goal compatible

274

with the finiteness of that part of the biosphere accessible
to the American people turns on what happens in the
moral realm — on determination of the content of this
goal and construction of a penalty-reward system cal-
culated to make the goal realizable. Market forces alone
cannot assure its realization, for the reasons that make
exchange, though the main organizing principle, inade-
quate without appropriate institutional and legal under-
pinnings. A population goal cannot be settled upon in
isolation, but must be viewed as one of a set of inter-
related goals, the attainability of any one of which turns
on the weight attached to other goals within the frame-
work of a finite physical as well as social environment.

275

Separate Statements of John N. Erlenborn

Child Care

In this section, the Report recommends a universally avail-
able child-care system. In the sense that the Commission holds
voluntary participation to be essential, the Commission's posi-
tion that participation in a child-care program not be a con-
dition for other governmental assistance is not inconsistent.
What is difficult to reconcile is the contention that a child-
care system affords opportunities for learning, development,
and companionship; but government should not require the
people it supports to utilize these opportunities. These are the
very people who, through little fault of their own, are other-
wise isolated from these advantages and, as a consequence,
from the mainstream of society. Thus, they are the very people
who have the most to gain from exposure to child-care pro-
grams, but who may, understandably, be the most hesitant and
apprehensive about volunteering.

In fairness to them, I believe they deserve priority in any
child-care system financed by the federal government. In fair-
ness to those who pay the bill for any government-sponsored
program, I believe the government has the responsibility to set
conditions which attempt to assure fulfillment of the program's
goal. This should be no less true in the case of the welfare
program, where one of the goals is to assist people in finding
a meaningful and contributory niche in society, than it is in
any other program.

All this is not to say I am prepared to support the Commis-
sion's recommendation for government to subsidize — beyond
the tax relief recently enacted — a comprehensive child-care
program of sufficient proportions to accommodate all those
who want to participate. If the demand for child-care service
continues to grow — and that seems to be the sign of the times
— I believe those who want it should be willing to pay for it, if
they can.

I am also convinced that pre-kindergarten education should

276

not be established as a separate federal school system, but
should be integrated with other private and public education.

Children Born out of Wedlock

I agree with much of the analysis presented in this section
on the need to reduce the social and moral stigma attached to
children born out of wedlock. It is no fault of the child that the
circumstances of his birth may have been deemed irregular
by society. Thus, anything that this Commission's recommen-
dations can do to reduce or eliminate the social and moral
stigma is appropriate.

I am not, however, similarly convinced that the legal rami-
fications of the distinction between legitimacy and illegitimacy
have been fully analyzed by the Commission in sufficient depth
to enable it to recommend that the legal status of a child born
out of wedlock be the same as a legitimate child. The purpose
of the legal discrimination was not, as the Commission states,
to protect the sanctity of family and discourage extramarital
sex, so much as it was to clarify and make more certain the
inheritance of property and the rights of individuals to legally
obligate others. Even if the purpose had been to protect the
family and discourage extramarital sex, the fact that the goal
has not been realized causes me to argue against the relaxation
of restrictions; it could easily be argued that the restrictions
should be tightened, not weakened. By analogy, one could also
argue that since laws against murder have not eliminated mur-
der, they should be abolished.

The examples cited in the Report of reductions of discrim-
ination only point out the complexities of the matter. For ex-
ample, the amendments to the Social Security Act recognize,
appropriately, certain conditions such as contributions to the
support of the child by the father or a court decree identifying
the father as a necessary precondition, a substitute, if you will,
for marriage, "legitimizing" the status of the child. Unless there
is some overt act of assumption of responsibility, the distinc-
tion is not removed.

Because of the complexities of the matter, I can agree that
research and study by the American Bar Association, the
American Law Institute, and other groups concerned with state
laws are appropriate. I cannot, however, join in the Commis-
sion's recommendation that all legal distinctions between legiti-
mate and illegitimate children be eliminated.

277

Women: Alternatives to Childbearing

Throughout this section, there runs the refrain that our
primary object and goal is to provide greater freedom to the
individual in society. In urging the adoption of the Equal
Rights Amendment, the Commission may be inciting the sub-
stitution of greater regimentation and control rather than
encouraging the expansion of individual freedom.

We are a pluralistic society. The vitality, the experimenta-
tion, the openness of our society is directly attributable, I
believe, to the fact that we are free to march to the tune of
different drummers. To force our citizens into a straitjacket
of conformity and sameness would stultify individuality and
undermine freedom. Yet I believe that in the name of equality
such a course of action is being proposed here.

Women have been discriminated against in employment, in
education, in legal arrangements, and in family relationships.
I do not question this. To employ a blunderbuss, through
enactment of the Equal Rights Amendment or the anti-sex-
discrimination amendment to the education laws, however, can
harm as many or more than it can help; and there is a better
way to put an end to discrimination against women.

Wherever discrimination exists which deserves government
action to overcome it, efforts should be made — and are being
made — to provide remedies through measured steps, where
facts are gathered, causal relationships established, and the
margin for serious error reduced. In the enactment and now
the strengthening of the Equal Employment Opportunity Act,
this has been done. Similarly, it appears that both Houses of
Congress have agreed upon the need to eliminate clearly il-
logical and harmful sex discrimination in the areas of voca-
tional education and graduate higher education. Correctional
action is also being taken to equalize the property rights of
women and their status as heads of households.

The goal of the Equal Rights Amendment is to eliminate
distinctions between men and women in the law, but there
can be distinction without discrimination. Treating people
differently, respecting their individual needs and desires, look-
ing upon them as unique human beings — not as a part of a
statistical herd — is not discrimination. Treating everyone alike,
regardless of their preferences, however, is all too often
discriminatory.

Many women find enjoyment and gratification in remaining
home, being mothers, and rearing children. Eliminating laws

278

which protect that status is every bit as discriminatory as any
efforts to impose such a status or role. Adoption of the Equal
Rights Amendment, in particular, would not only have this
effect, but would tie the hands of Congress and the people in
efforts to recognize the uniqueness of individuals and their
right to pursue their own objectives.

For over a century, organized labor has struggled to ob-
tain protections for women who must or who choose to work.
I would assume that, if polled, most women would elect to
preserve these safeguards. Yet that which took many years
to obtain would be undone overnight if the Equal Rights
Amendment were adopted.

Serious erosion to individual freedom is also threatened in
the area of education through either the enactment of the
Equal Rights Amendment or legislation that permits the fed-
eral government to write admission policies where discrimina-
tion based upon sex has not been proven to exist. While no
one can tolerate the denial of the opportunity for an education
or fair consideration for employment in the field of education,
the fact is that the great strength of America's educational
system since the founding of the nation has been its freedom
from government dictation and control. Diversity and auton-
omy have been its hallmarks. This has included the establish-
ment of a variety of options which have been made available
to students, ranging all the way from totally one-sex schools
to equally balanced coeducation.

The organization of education has been based on that which
is best educationally for the individual, not on what mathe-
matical ratios dictate. To prohibit such diversity and autonomy
through the imposition of uniform requirements would con-
stitute a clear and present threat to our educational institu-
tions.

In graduate, professional, and vocational education, and
even in some of our public undergraduate schools, the evi-
dence is clear that discrimination — not diversity — exists. This
should be corrected, and corrective legislation is in the offing.
However, we have seen no indication that those who seek an
education at other levels and in other areas are prevented by
reason of sex from attaining their goal.

While figures on elementary and secondary education are
unavailable, the record discloses that, in undergraduate edu-
cation, females continue to represent a larger percentage of
total enrollment, increasing from 31.7 percent in 1946 to 41.1
percent in 1970. For first-time undergraduate enrollment, the
percentage increased from 28.3 percent in 1945 to 44.7
percent in 1970. In these same years, females represented

279

56.8 percent and 50.5 percent of the number graduating from
high school.

In sum, the fault I find with any remedy that attempts to
cure a variety of ills with a single stroke of the pen is that it
ignores the individual, removes the good with the bad, and
erodes principles which only peripherally touch upon the ills
at which the remedy is directed. Overall, the effect is to dis-
criminate where discrimination does not exist, and to restrict
rather than to free. I believe these pitfalls are inherent in the
Equal Rights Amendment and the recommendation that the
federal government direct the admissions of our elementary
and secondary schools as they relate to sex. Specific legisla-
tion to correct proven problems will permit us to avoid these
pitfalls.

Legal Impediments for Minors

I am compelled at the outset in commenting on this section
to offer an observation: I do not believe the Report is pro-
posing that contraceptive devices be sold through vending
machines in school corridors, and I hope it will not be so
construed.

As to contraception, the law, and minors, I wish the Com-
mission had applied an age qualification to the term minor.
Even so, I cannot join in the Commission's recommendation
that all legal restrictions on access to contraceptive informa-
tion and services should be eliminated to permit minors,
youngsters under the age at which they are legally responsible
for themselves, unlimited access to contraceptives and abor-
tions.

As I have stated elsewhere, the goal of increasing the quality
of life should not be paramount to the sanctity of life. The
exercise of any right in excess can lead to license.

Throughout this report, the emphasis on the rights of the
individual is used to justify increased individual freedom and
responsibility. Yet, the facts cited in the report, particularly
when dealing with questions of minors, show that minors are
often inexperienced and ill-equipped to deal with the ques-
tions that the new freedom gives them.

I would have preferred that the Commission qualify its
recommendation to give greater weight to circumstances and
the need for parental guidance. I can fully support the recom-
mendations that the consequences of illegitimacy and teenage
pregnancy be reduced so that the mother will have a chance
of enjoying a satisfying life. The tensions associated with what

280

is, perhaps, an unwanted pregnancy should be reduced. At
the same time, however, we should not detach ourselves, as the
Commission does, from the related moral and social questions.

By eliminating any need or concern for parental guidance,
the Commission essentially takes the view that the child
knows better than the parent what his rights and responsibili-
ties are. This, in my view, goes too far in placing emphasis on
individual right, and tends to ignore responsibility for one's
own actions.

A particular fear haunts me with regard to the lack of a
recommendation that teenagers be exempted from laws per-
mitting voluntary sterilization beyond the assumption that
usual and accepted medical judgment will be exercised.

I do not know of any age a human being passes through
that is more impressionable, more susceptible to suggestion,
than the teen years. To couple this impressionability with
access to sterilization without parental guidance can mean that
many youngsters, in their zeal to be patriotic, to do something
for mankind, will know more than a few moments of torment
and regret.

It is no answer, to my mind, to these young people and
others merely to suggest that sperm banks can alleviate con-
cern about a change of mind. Technology in this area has not
advanced to the stage that permits this guarantee. And, finally,
the moral questions posed by artificial insemination remain
unresolved.

Abortion

I cannot accept the recommendation that present state
abortion laws be liberalized to allow abortions to be per-
formed on request.

My basic premise is that we must include within our con-
cern for the quality and enhancement of life a respect for
life itself — indeed, it should be paramount. Otherwise, the
concern for the enhancement or enrichment of life is entirely
materialistic. Thus, I believe the Report should have resolved
the moral and ethical issues it raised. The Report could have
served a useful purpose at this point by a more wide-ranging
discussion of these issues. Instead, it does nothing to clarify
the fundamental bases on which people now quite rightly
object to liberalized abortion.

A discussion of the moral and ethical issues, I realize, is
not an easy task. How, for instance, do we distinguish be-
tween abortion and infanticide? The goal of relieving the

281

mother of the burdens of child-rearing is the same; thus,
some distinction between the means must lead to a recom-
mendation of the one and not the other.

At what point in the development of the fetus do we con-
sider it to be human life worthy of the protection of society?
And what event signals the change of the fetus from the state
of nonhuman to human? My own view is that the fetus is a
new, separate human being from the moment of conception.

It would be helpful for those reading this report to be able
to review the reasoning leading to the judgment that liberal
abortion is morally defensible. In my own view, it is difficult,
if not impossible, to reach that moral judgment, and yet stop
short of justifying infanticide, euthanasia, or the killing of the
severely mentally or physically handicapped.

I believe that the failure of the text to resolve these ques-
tions of moral judgment places the recommendation outside a
moral context.

Viewed within a moral or ethical context, I do not believe
that this society can accept the destruction of human life for
the comfort or convenience of individuals within the society.

Furthermore, the recommendations do not reflect the com-
plexity of potential situations in which abortion may be
called for. It does not distinguish, for example, between the
rights of married and unmarried women to request abortion.
What may be appropriate for an unmarried woman to decide
between herself and her doctor may be completely inap-
propriate for a married woman, who thus ignores the rights
of her husband. Moreover, there are numerous distinctions
of a medical nature which could be made to limit the scope
of the recommendation.

In this section, the Commission notes the difficulty of as-
sessing the demographic impact of liberalized abortion. Its
impact would be small, no doubt less than that of immigra-
tion. And yet, abortion on request takes precedence as a
recommendation over one concerning the limiting of immi-
gration. Since this is a "Population" Commission and not a
"Birth Control" Commission, what compelling consideration
leads the Commission to make this very controversial recom-
mendation when it has little or no population or demographic
consequence?

In summary, for all of the reasons noted, I find it impossi-
ble to join with the Commission in these recommendations.

282

Methods of Fertility Control

A trait common to groups and organizations concerned
about a particular problem is citing their issue as one of
highest priority, but failing to view it in the context of other
problems that confront us as a nation. Obviously, not all of
the myriad dilemmas we are trying to solve can be classified
as being of highest priority.

Specifically, the Commission recommends that this nation
give highest priority to fertility control research and that the
full $93 million authorized for this purpose for fiscal year
1973 be appropriated and allocated. Next, it recommends
that federal expenditures for such research rise to a minimum
of $150 million by 1975.

To put the full funding recommendation in perspective, it
is necessary to examine the definition of the word "authoriza-
tion" as it pertains to legislation. In simplest terms, it sets a
limit on the amount that may be appropriated for a given pur-
pose. It is a figure that, more often than not, is merely taken
from thin air. Rarely does an authorization reflect a diligent
inquiry into actual needs or a search for an amount that can
be efficiently and effectively expended during a defined period.

If Congress were to heed the cry for full funding of each
of the authorizations it makes, the federal budget would be
more than three times the $246.3 billion requested for fiscal
year 1973. The amount of the federal debt would be impond-
erable.

Viewed in this light, the necessity to evaluate each request
for funds alongside all of the other requests in the budget as
a whole is clearly evident. The Report notes that amount ex-
pended thus far by the federal government for f ertility control
research is modest in terms of total research expenditures,
but no attempt is made to assess this demand for funds as they
relate to the thousands of other funding demands.

In like manner, the Report makes specific recommendations
for funding levels of family planning projects. We are not
suggesting that the amounts recommended are either too high
or too low, but rather that they are merely judgments; and
we do not want to judge funding levels for these purposes
in isolation from funding requests for all other programs.

Equally important, the discussions on funds do not take into
account the fact that federal support for family planning
services and fertility control research in fiscal year 1973 will
rise to $240 million, a threefold increase since fiscal 1969.

283

Fertility-Related Services

The Commission recommends that both ". . . public and
private health financing mechanisms should begin paying the
full cost of all health services related to fertility, including
prenatal, delivery, and postpartum services; pediatric care for
the first year of life; voluntary sterilization; safe termination
of unwanted pregnancy; and medical treatment of infertility."
Moreover, the Commission suggests: "The same type of cov-
erage could be built into existing private insurance programs."

Either way, it seems to me, the public pays. Indeed, perhaps
the public is willing. I suggest, however, that in making that
decision several considerations warrant examination.

First, of course, it is important to ascertain the present
direction of private insurance. Those of us who do not earn
our livelihood through the private insurance system know that
health insurance (and my reference to health insurance in-
cludes the whole gamut — medical, surgical, hospital, major,
and comprehensive) is costly. What is more, we know it does
not provide all the benefits we seek and premiums go up when
new benefits are added. We can probably all agree as well
that the only way medical expenses are going to go is up. And
we rightfully ask whether private insurance can provide a
remedy.

In its 1971-72 report, the Health Insurance Institute tells
us that some 170 million Americans under age 65 were pro-
tected by one or more forms of private health insurance in
1970. Despite Medicare, which serves those over age 65, over
11 million more persons, or 59 percent of the total population
age 65 and over, carried private health insurance policies to
supplement Medicare in 1970.

From its birth in 1950 until 1970, major medical expense
insurance — wherein each individual pays the first $100 or so
each year for health expenses and 10 to 15 percent of expenses
over the deductible amount — had expanded to cover 78 million
people.

Without a doubt, the system is responsive, flexible, and ex-
pandable, but nonetheless in need of improvement. The ques-
tion is, what form marks improvement?

It is my conviction that additional expenditures, be they
public or private, for health-related costs should be devoted
to answering our needs for more medical personnel (a pro-
gram already under way, I should point out), to allaying the

284

burden to individuals of prolonged or unusually heavy medical
expenses, and to preventive medicine.

It seems to me we must recognize that this nation has basic
needs that government can and must meet, but that our na-
tion's capital is not a bottomless well from which we can pump
endlessly without fear of the well running dry. There is a
limit, and genuine priorities must be set. Surely public sub-
sidy of sterilization and abortion should not come at the head
of the list of priorities.

285

Separate Statement of D. Gale Johnson

After the Commission had approved "Racial and Ethnic
Minorities," a study by Finis Welch of the Graduate Center,
City University of New York and the National Bureau of
Economic Research, came to my attention; this study throws
new and important light on the returns to education for blacks
and whites. The comparisons in the text on income by educa-
tion are for males 25 years of age and older and seem to in-
dicate that income gains from increased education, especially
college education, are very small for blacks. Mr. Welch under-
took a new analysis of the 1960 Census of Population data in
which the data for both whites and blacks were analyzed by
estimated years of work experience. In effect, the years of
work experience was the number of years since each indi-
vidual left school.

His conclusion with respect to the analysis of income and
education data for 1969 was:

In the 1959 data, the evidence is that for persons with
1-4 years of experience, black earnings rise relative to
white earnings as school completion levels increase. This
point has not been previously noted. For persons with
5-12 years of experience, the black/white earning ratio
is insensitive to schooling and for persons with 13-25
years of experience the relative earnings of blacks falls
as schooling increases.

A similar analysis of data for 1966 reveals two results of
great significance. First, for blacks who entered the labor
force in 1959 or later, the percentage increase in income for
each additional year was substantially greater than for whites.
Second, blacks who entered the labor force between 1947
and 1958 retained the same percentage income gains from an
additional year of schooling relative to the income gains for
whites in 1966 as had been found for 1959.

These conclusions are consistent with the behavior of black
young men and women. In the last two decades, there has been

286

a substantial narrowing of the gap between the number of
years of schooling completed by blacks and whites. In 1969,
blacks who were 25 to 29 years old had a median years of
school completed of 12.1 years compared to 12.6 years for
whites. For persons who were 45 to 54 years old in 1969,
the median years of schooling completed was 9.1 for blacks
and 10.9 for whites.

Mr. Welch's study and, more importantly, the decisions
made by young black men and women cast considerable doubt
upon the quite strongly held view that the returns to education
for recent entrants to the labor force is now substantially lower
for blacks than for whites. That the returns to education for
blacks who entered the labor force before the late 1940's is
below the return realized by whites is not in doubt.

It is good that the data from the 1970 Census of Popula-
tion will soon be available to permit further analysis of the
returns to education.

287

Separate Statement of John R. Meyer

Forecasting economic events even for a few months into
the future is a hazardous exercise. Making extrapolations for
three decades or so, as one is required to do if one is to fore-
cast the impact of demographic developments, is an even more
uncertain undertaking. The Commission was therefore com-
mendably cautious in asserting what it could identify as the
probable economic impacts of slower population growth.

Nevertheless, there exists a growing body of highly inter-
esting though speculative, literature on what the many differ-
ent economic facts or aspects might be of slower population
growth. Some of these contributions were done at the request
of the Commission and will be issued as supplemental research
reports. These comments, in fact, are largely drawn from those
reports.

Perhaps the most important of these speculations concerns
the possible impact of slower population growth on the extent
and incidence of poverty in the United States. It seems highly
probable that per capita incomes overall will be almost 100
percent higher than they are today by the end of this century
if Americans adopt a two-child family as their norm and 75
percent higher if they opt for the three-child family. Certainly,
such income increases should help reduce the absolute if not
the relative incidence of poverty in our society.

However, reasons also exist for suspecting that slower popu-
lation growth could help equalize the distribution of income as
well. A slower growing population tends to be an older popula-
tion, and it is a reasonably well-established economic fact that
people save more in the later parts of their working lives,
that is after the ages of 45 or 50 or so. Accordingly, some of
the economists advising the Commission have suggested that
these higher savings rates may depress the rate of return on
capital and correspondingly increase the share of total national
income going to labor. Since wage and salary income are more
important to lower than higher income groups, and conversely
for returns on investments, such a shift would suggest some
equalization in the distribution of income.

288

Even without this effect, which is admittedly quite specu-
lative, there are other reasons for suspecting that slower popu-
lation growth could imply a more equal income distribution.
Specifically, more unwanted births appear to have occurred
historically among poorer families. Thus, the reduction of
family size from slower population growth may be greater for
these lower income families. In the late 1960's, in fact, the
birthrate for women in families with incomes of less than
$5,000 per annum declined by over 15 percent more than for
the rest of our society. The poor still have a higher birthrate
than the middle classes — but the recent trends suggest that this
discrepancy may be disappearing. Thus, even if family or
household incomes do not go up relatively more rapidly for
poor families in the future — and as we have just noted there
are some reasons for suspecting that they may — the per capita
income available to members of lower income families could
rise relatively because their family sizes will shrink relatively
rapidly.

Another economic benefit that we might derive from slower
population growth would be some simplification of the struc-
tural problems we now seem to face in absorbing labor force
growth. This, in turn, could reduce the intensity and fre-
quency of certain classes of unemployment problems that now
bedevil our society. Many of our present unemployment diffi-
culties, for example, are due to a sharp rise in unemployment
of teenagers and those in their early twenties who are now a
larger and increasing proportion of our society because of the
post-war baby boom. To illustrate what this means, consider
the years 1949 and 1971 which had virtually identical overall
unemployment rates, 5.9 percent. In 1971, however, the 16- to
24-year-old unemployment rate was 12.7 percent, while in
1949 it was 10.8 percent. And again, do not forget that the
higher percentage rate in 1971 was applied to a larger portion
of the total population than in 1949. Or, to put the matter
slightly differently, if we were to calculate the ratio of un-
employment rates for those 16 to 19 years of age to the unem-
ployment rate for those 25 years and over, we would find
that the annual average of this ratio was approximately three
times higher in the late 1960's than it was in 1949 or 1950;
indeed, this ratio even in 1960 was 3.27, while at the end of
the 1960's it was almost 6.0. Slower population growth implies
(though it does not guarantee for reasons that are outlined
elsewhere in this Report) a steadier and relatively smaller
flow of young people into the labor market and this in turn
should simplify planning their absorption into the labor force.

It should be stressed, though, that reduced entry pressures

289

on labor markets from slower population growth will not be
realized quickly. Again, there is the momentum created by
the post-war baby boom. Thus, the level of new entrants into
the labor force during the 1970's should average approximately
3.5 million or almost 700,000 persons per year more than the
annual average for the 1960's. By the 1980's, however, growth
in the number of labor force entrants should be nominal. What
happens in the 1990's, of course, depends on what our birth-
rates in the 1970's actually prove to be.

Adversities, of course, can flow from slower population
growth as well as advantages. For example, some economists
advised the Commission that slower population growth might
complicate the problem of maintaining full employment in our
economy. An equal number of economists advising us said just
the opposite. As just noted, slower population growth might as
well simplify as complicate certain aspects of achieving full
employment. So, on balance, it would seem that the Commis-
sion was correct in concluding that unemployment would not
be a serious consequence of slower population growth. In es-
sence, an unemployment problem can be solved by wise fiscal
and monetary policies. Slower population growth is a very
cumbersome and imperfect substitute for such wisdom.

Another difficulty of slower population growth noted by the
Commission is that an older labor force may lack the vigor or
flexibility to keep productivity growing at historic rates. A
question also arises of whether a work force more uniformly
distributed by age brackets will provide as many incentives
(opportunities for promotion) as the present pyramidal age
structure. In essence, a more uniform distribution of workers
by age, while it may simplify certain absorption problems at
the lower end of the age spectrum, may create new structural
problems elsewhere in the system.

Clearly, one approach to solving such new problems is, as
the Commission suggested, development of new and better pro-
grams of continuing education. The required structural adapta-
tion may necessitate certain other changes as well, such as
reinforcement of the basic market or pricing mechanisms in
our economy which we depend on for the realignment of
resources and economic activities.

290

Separate Statement of Grace Olivarez

To brush aside a separate statement on the issue of abortion
on the grounds that it is based on religious or denominational
"hang-ups" is to equate abortion — a matter of life and death —
with simpler matters of religion such as observance of the Sab-
bath, dietary restrictions, abstention from coffee and alcoholic
beverages, or other similar religious observances. I prefer to
believe that even nonreligious persons would be concerned with
the issue of life and death, even as to the unborn.

My opposition to legalized abortion is based on several con-
cerns that touch a variety of issues, not the least of which is
the effect such a law would have on millions of innocent and
ill-informed persons. These concerns center around the rights
of women to control their own bodies, the rights of the unborn
child, the poor in our society, the safety of abortion, our coun-
try's commitment to preventive as opposed to remedial mea-
sures and our future as a democratic society.

Rights of Women to Control Their Own Bodies

I fail to understand the argument that women have a right
to control their own bodies. Control over one's body does not
stem from a right, but depends on individual self-image and a
sense of responsibility. I am not referring to the victim of rape
or incest. And I am not referring to the poor for whom contra-
ceptive services and techniques are not as accessible as we
would want them to be.

With the recent advances in contraceptive technology, any
woman who so desires is better able to control her fertility in a
more effective way than has ever before been available. I
accept the argument that, aside from total abstention, there is
no perfect contraceptive; but no one can argue that effective
contraceptives are more available now than ever before, but
are effective only if used. Personal and contraceptive failures
do not give women the "right" to correct or eliminate the so-
called "accident" by destroying the fetus.

291

Advocacy by women for legalized abortion on a national
scale is so anti-women's liberation and women's freedom that
it flies in the face of what some of us are trying to accomplish
through the women's movement, namely, equality— equality
means an equal sharing of responsibilities by and as men and
women.

With women already bearing the major burden for the
reproductive process, men have never had it so good. Women
alone must suffer the consequences of an imperfect contra-
ceptive pill — the blood clots, severe headaches, nausea, edema,
etc. Women alone endure the cramping and hemorrhaging
from an intrauterine device. No man ever died from an
abortion.

A more serious question is the kind of future we all have to
look forward to if men are excused either morally or legally
from their responsibility for participation in the creation of
life. Women should be working to bring men into the camp of
responsible parenthood, a responsibility that women have had
to shoulder almost alone. Perhaps in our eagerness for equality,
we have, in fact, contributed to the existing irresponsible atti-
tude some men have toward their relationship to women and
their offspring. Legalized abortion will free those men from
worrying about whether they should bear some responsibility
for the consequences of sexual experience. In the matter of
divorce where children are involved, for instance, very few
men fight or even ask for custody of their children. It is cus-
tomary to measure their responsibility in terms of dollars and
cents, rather than in terms of affection, attention, companion-
ship, supervision, and warmth.

And laymen are not the only ones who reflect this attitude.
Blame must also be placed on churchmen, who throughout the
tumult and controversy surrounding legalized abortion, have
expressed their concern only as abortion affects the moral and
psychological problems of women, adroitly avoiding the issue
of man's responsibility to decisions connected with his role in
the reproductive process.

Abortion After Rape and Incest

Pregnancy as a result of forcible rape is not common. As a
rule, forcible rape involves a struggle, the effects of which can
be outwardly detected. An observing parent or adult can detect
the effects of such a struggle in a young girl. There is a personal
responsibility for reporting such assaults. To shirk this duty
under the guise of privacy, pride, or dignity is to permit abuses

292

to go unpunished and to condemn an innocent girl to live in
anguish through no fault of her own. Forcible rape should be
reported as the crime that it is. Under such circumstances, the
victim is given medical attention and medication that can pre-
vent her from getting pregnant.

The key words in the definition of rape are: "without her
consent." There are varying degrees of consent and resistance.
To permit abortion because a woman has had a change of mind
or heart after intercourse, is to deny justice to the unborn child.

Generally speaking, incest is more prevalent. Proving incest
is difficult. Pregnancies resulting from incest are seldom re-
ported or recorded as such. As in rape, abortion in this instance
is punishing the child and the young girl.

Rights of the Unborn Child

In relation to the rights of the unborn child, we seem to be
confused as to the meaning of human life before and after
birth. The fetus does not become "a life" at a specific magic
moment in the process of development. Some biologists sup-
port the foregoing and I quote from one of them:

Everyone of the higher animals starts life as a single cell —
the fertilized ovum. . . . The union of two such sex cells
(male germ cell and female germ cell) to form a zygote
constitutes the process of fertilization and initiates the
life of a new individual." [Emphasis mine.] | Bradley M.
Patten, Foundations of Embryology, New York: Mc-
Graw-Hill, 1964, page 2.]

Neither is it a "mass of cells," as anyone who has witnessed
an abortion can testify to. Having witnessed some abortions, I
would ask those in favor of abortion to visit any hospital where
abortions are performed and request permission to see an
aborted fetus. It will not be intact unless the abortion was
performed by the saline method. Then it will be pickled, but
intact.

Wanted" and "Unwanted" Fertility

To talk about the "wanted" and the "unwanted" child smacks
too much of bigotry and prejudice. Many of us have experi-
enced the sting of being "unwanted" by certain segments of our
society. Blacks were "wanted" when they could be kept in

293

slavery. When that ceased, blacks became "unwanted" — in
white suburbia, in white schools, in employment. Mexican-
American (Chicano) farm laborers were "wanted" when they
could be exploited by agri-business. Chicanos who fight for
their constitutional rights are "unwanted" people. One usually
wants objects and if they turn out to be unsatisfactory, they are
returnable. How often have ethnic minorities heard the state-
ment: "if you don't like it here, why don't you go back to
where you came from?" Human beings are not returnable
items. Every individual has his/her rights, not the least of
which is the right to life, whether born or unborn. Those with
power in our society cannot be allowed to "want" and "un-
want" people at will.

The Poor in Our Society

I am not impressed nor persuaded by those who express
concern for the low-income woman who may find herself
carrying an unplanned pregnancy and for the future of the
unplanned child who may be deprived of the benefits of a full
life as a result of the parents' poverty, because the fact re-
mains that in this affluent nation of ours, pregnant cattle and
horses receive better health care than pregnant poor women.

The poor cry out for justice and equality and we respond
with legalized abortion.

The Commission heard enough expert testimony to the
effect that increased education and increased earnings result
in lower fertility rates. In the developed countries of the world,
declining fertility rates are correlated with growing prosperity,
improved educational facilities and, in general, overall im-
provement in the standard of living.

But it is not necessary to go beyond our own borders to
verify this contention. Current data indicate that the same
holds true for minority groups in this country. The higher the
education attained by minorities and the broader the oppor-
tunities, the lower the fertility rate.

Thus, the sincerity of our concern for population growth
(because of its effect on the quality of life for all people) will
be tested, if, in the face of incontrovertible facts, we move
rapidly to utilize alternatives to abortion in order to reduce
fertility.

294

The Safety of Abortion

The general public has not been given all the facts on the
dangers, risks, and side effects resulting from abortion. On the
contrary, we have been told that abortion is a "safe and
simple" procedure, as easy as "extracting a tooth."

These are the facts. In Japan, Hungary, Yugoslavia,
Sweden, England, and the United States, studies and surveys
indicate that abortions are not that safe.

In Japan, for example, a survey conducted in 1969 by the
Office of the Prime Minister revealed an increasing percent-
age of five different complaints reported by women after abor-
tion. These include increases in tubal pregnancies, menstrual
irregularities, abdominal pain, dizziness, headaches, subse-
quent spontaneous miscarriage, and sterility.

Although one could argue that abdominal pain, dizziness,
and headaches can be experienced by anyone, sterility, tubal
pregnancy, and subsequent miscarriages are after-effects that
have been reported in other countries.

From the Hungarian Women's Journal, April 17, 1971,
No. 16, come the following statistics:

At every 87th abortion, surgery (uterus) perforation
occurs.

At every 40th abortion, hemorrhaging complications set
in, to such degree that the woman has to be hospitalized
and again requires medical help.

Every 55th abortion is followed by inflammation.

Totaled up, this means that complications can be expected
at every 25th abortion; or, out of every 100,000 abortions,
4000 patients must be hospitalized and require close medical
attention. There were 12 maternal deaths out of 278,122 abor-
tions recorded in New York after abortion became available
on request.

Dr. Donald L. Hutchinson, Chief of the Department of
Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Pittsburgh
School of Medicine, was quoted in the Los Angeles Times,
February 16, 1971, as follows:

A survey of complications following 1,400 therapeutic
abortions showed that about 10%, or 140, of the women

295

had significant medical complications following the pro-
cedure. The most serious complication was one death
which occurred during surgery made necessary by the
failure of the method — injection of salt — used to induce
the abortion. . . . Among 1000 women aborted by the
"D and C" method (dilation and curettage) there were
six that required major surgery as a result of laceration
of the wall of the womb. In several cases the womb had
to be removed. Among the 400 women on whom the
salt solution injections were used, the most serious com-
plications resulted from the injection of the solution into
blood vessels. In three other cases there was evidence that
the salt had gotten into the circulatory system and had
been carried around the body ... in another case there
were transient signs of brain damage while other cases
included infections and the loss of blood through hemor-
rhaging, with the result that 5% of the 1,400 required
blood transfusions.

Numerous other statistics on the after-effects of abortion
exist, but are not included for lack of space. However, the
New York experience, which is being touted as "highly suc-
cessful" cannot go unchallenged.

Mr. Gordon Chase, New York City Health Services Ad-
ministrator, in testimony before the Commission's hearings
in New York City on September 27, 1971, reported that New
York had experienced a birth decline since the advent of the
abortion law. The fact is that the entire nation experienced a
birth decline during the same period without legalized
abortion.

The reduction in maternal deaths in New York, as reported
by Mr. Chase, was credited to abortions. This is an assump-
tion and not a proven fact. The decline in birthrates obviously,
in itself, accounts for the decline in maternal mortality. Be-
sides, maternal mortality declined throughout the country.

Recent statistics indicate that over 60 percent of abortions
performed in New York were performed on out-of-state resi-
dents. Complications and deaths occurring as a result of abor-
tions performed in New York on out-of-state women would
not be recorded in New York; therefore, any New York
statistics on the safety of abortion are challengeable at every
level. Statistics can be categorized in different ways to support
different conclusions.

Infant mortality rates are not reduced by killing an unborn
child. How sad and incriminating that quality health facilities
and services, denied to the poor for lack of money, are being

296

used for performing abortions instead of being utilized for
healing of the sick poor. But then, one represents a profit and
the other an expense. It is all a matter of values.

Our Commitment to Preventive Measures

Although we pride ourselves on being a nation that believes
in "a stitch in time saves nine," we really do not practice it.
The Commission's Report includes a section on "Methods of
Fertility Control" which I consider an excellent expose of
this nation's lack of commitment to the development of safer
and more effective preventive measures for fertility control.
If it is true that this society does not want to see abortion used
as a means for population control, then I, for one, will expect
an immediate and dramatic allocation and distribution of re-
sources into the field of research on reproductive physiology;
the development of safer, more effective, and more acceptable
methods of fertility control for everyone — men and women —
plus wide-scale distribution of same throughout the country.
The degree of swiftness this nation employs in moving in that
direction will measure the extent of its commitment to check
population growth through preventive measures and not with
abortion.

Our Future as a Democratic Society

The ease with which destruction of life is advocated for
those considered either socially useless or socially disturb-
ing instead of educational or ameliorative measures may
be the first danger sign of loss of creative liberty in think-
ing, which is the hallmark of a democratic society. [Leo
Alexander, M.D., The New England Journal of Medi-
cine, Vol. 241, July 14, 1949.]

In order to persuade the citizen that he controls his
destiny, that morality informs decisions and that tech-
nology is the servant rather than the driving force, it is
necessary today to distort information. The ideal of in-
forming the public has given way to trying to convince
the public that forced actions are actually desirable ac-
tion ... we are consenting to our own deepening self-
destruction. [Ivan Illich, Celebration of Awareness, New
York: Anchor Books, Doubleday & Co., Inc., page 4.]

297

When one considers that medical science has developed four
different ways for killing a fetus, but has not yet developed
a safe-for-all-to-use contraceptive, the preceding quotes can-
not be dismissed as the ramblings of extremists.

I believe that, in a society that permits the life of even one
individual (born or unborn) to be dependent on whether that
life is "wanted" or not, all its citizens stand in danger.

As long as we continue to view abortion as a solution, we
will continue to avoid facing the real issue — that abortion
treats the symptom and neglects the disease. When you con-
sider that more than half of all abortions performed in New
York were performed on women under 24 years of age (and
not on "those unfortunate women who could not face the
prospect of still another child"), you begin to get a glimpse
of one aspect of the "disease." When you consider the cur-
rent rush to reform the welfare system because the cost has
gotten out of hand supposedly as a result of "all those chil-
dren being born to those lazy women," but subsidies to profit-
making entities suffer not one iota, one begins to get a glimpse
of the disease.

When all of our people have access to the same benefits,
advantages, and opportunities, abortion will not be necessary.

298

Separate Statements of James S. Rummonds

Perspective on Population

I do not agree that "the policies recommended here all
lead in the right directions for this Nation, and generally at
low costs." It seems to me that too many of the policies we
have recommended, both explicitly and implicitly, are in the
wrong direction and have heavy social-psychological environ-
mental costs associated with them. While I agree that it is
critically important that population growth be stabilized, I
would go beyond that and say that the present size and dis-
tribution of the population in the United States is inconsistent
with the traditional values of individual freedom, individual
justice, and the true spirit of democracy. As stated in the
introduction, the population issue raises profound questions
of what people want, what they need, and what people are
for. It is against this broader perspective that we have to
measure the cost and direction of our population policies.

A common thread which underlies many aspects of the
"population problem" is the rapid growth of urban areas of
unprecedented size. The rapid rate and extent of population
concentration is clearly illustrated in the growth of urban
areas of one million or more people:

Year

Number of such areas

Percent of total pop.

1940

28%

1960

38%

1980

54%

2000

444-

63%

If we had wished to avoid this massive concentration of
people we could have done so by avoiding, not only popula-
tion growth, but economic growth. Our huge urban areas are
essentially creatures of economic forces evolved for economic
ends. The motivating forces have been economies of scale,
specialization and division of labor, profit to the developer,

299

and efficiency in production. Thus, there is a direct linkage
between our economy and population problems.

The result of these unbridled economic forces has been the
creation of an almost totally manmade living environment —
built initially by economic necessity and now reflective of
only a narrow portion of the full range of human needs and
concerns. As we rapidly become a nation that is almost
totally urban-industrial, our manmade environments will in-
creasingly shape our individual and collective behavior. Since
we are presently products of environments of our own un-
certain and narrow making, it seems obvious we had best
be sure we are "making man" deliberately and consonant with
his highest human potentials in the future.

In earlier times our deference to economic forces for order-
ing our existence was necessitated by the struggle for sub-
sistence. The pressure for sheer physical survival in an agri-
culturally based economy made a virtue of pursuing one's
own competitive self-interest. However, our rapidly increasing
affluence makes survival concerns more and more inappro-
priate as goals around which to order our lives. The decreasing
importance of survival concerns is reflected in the growth of
our real family incomes which were roughly $2,400 in 1939,
$9,400 in 1969, and are expected to be in excess of $21,000
by the year 2000. Another indication of our new-found afflu-
ence is shown by the fact that the proportion of the population
in poverty has dropped from roughly 60 percent in 1929 to
12 percent today.

It seems clear, then, that a few select nations are rapidly
entering a new age of human history where an increasing
majority will live far beyond subsistence. However, our pres-
ent values and institutions have been evolved for the express
purpose of coping with the problem of marginal survival.
Now, man has suddenly been deprived of his traditional
economic purpose. We have been caught off guard by our
success. We have only begun to realize how far we have
come, let alone to think what might lie beyond. Thus, the
fundamental question of our time arises: Are our contempo-
rary values and institutions, inherited from a subsistence era,
adequate or even desirable in coping with the problems and
potentials of relative affluence, sophisticated technologies, and
huge population agglomerations? There is mounting evidence
which suggests that our continued reliance upon traditional
economic forces will lead us into a population distribution
future, as well as a larger American future, that is neither
wanted nor desirable.

300

Economic — Research data shows that our larger urban
areas are growing because of the momentum of natural
increase and in-migration rather than because of any sig-
nificant economies of scale associated with their size. It
appears that an urban place of 200,000 people is as effi-
cient as one of several million. Therefore, the economic
rationale for allowing the size of our urban areas to
increase is marginal at best.

Political — We value our democratic processes yet, other
things being equal, it appears to be more difficult to
exercise our democratic prerogatives as the size of the
political unit increases. First, as the number of citizens
increases, the time that can be spent with any one of
them by a government official decreases. Second, as
urban size increases there is a more than proportionate
increase in public service demanded; thereby putting an
even greater burden upon the democratic processes.
Third, with size comes a complexity which makes it in-
creasingly difficult for the average citizen to maintain
the "relative political maturity" necessary to effectively
participate in the decision-making processes. Fourth, the
trend toward metropolitan government will aggravate
the first three impediments to a "grass-roots" democracy.

Social — We tend to judge the "goodness" of our urban
concentrations by whether or not they seem to induce such
behavioral extremes as criminality, mental illness, high
divorce rates, etc. The few crude studies that have been
conducted have been largely inconclusive but the implicit
conclusion has been: Since our big cities don't produce
much bad behavior, they therefore must be good places to
live. However, since man is so highly adaptable, he can tol-
erate very undesirable environments without exhibiting
pathological behavior. Clearly, reliance upon crude "tol-
erance" indicators to measure our social well-being will
insure our living in an environment without the beauty
and serenity of the countryside, without the stability and
sense of community of a small town, and within the
culturally desolate confines of a homogeneous suburban
social layer.

Environmental — It has been conclusively documented in
the Commission's research that large population agglom-
erations aggravate environmental problems. This includes

301

increasing air pollution, increasing noise pollution, de-
creasing access to open spaces, increasing travel time to
work, increasing respiratory ailments, and adverse cli-
matic changes. To make things worse, our research has
also shown that it is oftentimes more expensive to cope
with these difficulties in a larger urban environment.

Diversity — We value diversity as a precondition to free-
dom since freedom of choice is meaningless without
something to choose from. And yet, a continuation of
present distribution trends will largely narrow living
choices to large urban agglomerations and will thereby
eliminate a major element of diversity from our lives.

Opinion Polls — We are becoming an increasingly urban
nation against the will of an absolute majority of the
population. Our opinion poll survey showed that 53
percent of the population preferred a small town or
country environment. Over 50 percent wanted the fed-
eral government to slow the growth of the large urban
areas and over 50 percent wanted the federal govern-
ment to encourage growth of smaller places. Implemen-
tation of policies consistent with these preferences would
give people a greater diversity of living environments to
choose from.

It seems clear, then, that we are blundering into a popula-
tion distribution pattern which is unwanted by the majority of
Americans. Historically, the pattern of urbanization has been
a by-product of the economic imperatives of industrialization.
Thus, we have trusted the control of our population distribu-
tion patterns largely to the workings of the marketplace. Only
now are we learning the central weakness of the market sys-
tem: the market has no inherent direction, no internal goal
other than to satisfy the forces of supply and demand. With
increasing abundance the market system continues to direct
human activities into accustomed economic channels — yielding
an increasing production and consumption of an ever larger
volume of ever less valued goods. Robert Heilbroner notes
that ". . . the danger exists that the market system, in an
environment of genuine abundance, may become an instru-
ment which liberates man from real want only to enslave
him to purposes foi which it is increasingly difficult to find
social and moral justification." What is required, then, is a
realization that to solve the "population problem" requires
us to create a new relationship between the economic aspects
of existence and human life in its totality. Our affluence not

302

only makes it possible but makes it imperative that we go
beyond strictly economic concerns and become creative
architects rather than passive pawns of our own environment.
What we need as a starting point are national goals or guiding
principles which go beyond a concern for mere quantity — in
short, a quality of life manifesto. I present the following as
a suggestive listing of those individual and collective goals
we might want to pursue as we become a post-industrial
society:

1. Efficiency: Efficient production is desirable but not so
desirable that in an affluent society it should take precedence
over higher human values. In other words, we should be
willing to accept some economic inefficiency as an inevitable
but necessary price in realizing noneconomic values.

2. Growth: Just as population growth can reach dis-
astrous proportions, so can economic growth. For example,
if the rest of the world were consuming at our level we would
quickly exhaust available resources. Our continued high rates
of growth are predicated upon continuing disparities among
nations of the rest of the world. Therefore, we need to mod-
erate our growth ethic and begin to create the society envi-
sioned by John Stuart Mill: "... in which while no one is
poor, no one desires to be richer, nor has any reason to fear
being thrust back by the efforts of others to push themselves
forward. . . . There would be as much scope as ever for all
kinds of mental culture, and moral and social progress; as
much room for improving the Art of Living and much more
likelihood of its being improved, when minds ceased to be
engrossed by the art of getting on."

3. Equity: Elimination of poverty in an affluent society
through overall increases in real income is too slow and unjust.
Further, large disparities in income will only serve to en-
courage further demands for economic growth as those less
advantaged note their relative rather than absolute income
position. A reduction in inequity is a necessary precondition
to justice as well as to the gradual attainment of a dynamic,
steady state economy.

4. Democracy: Big business requires big government to
control, big unions to bargain effectively, and big cities as
productive economic mechanisms. In each case the individual
comes to feel that he just "can't make a difference" as his
political power is swamped by huge, complex organizations.
Therefore, if we prize our democratic processes we had best
be willing to design our institutions so that they are com-
patible with democracy.

5. Environment: We can no longer assume the arrogant

303

role of mastery over nature; rather, we must learn to live in
balance and harmony with our environment. This means we
must be sensitive to the possibility of world-wide depletion
of resources and to the domestic aspects of environmental
degradation — particularly in our large urban areas.

6. Life Style: Finally, and perhaps most important, we need
to insure a physical environment that is conducive to a variety
of life styles. Underlying this is a recognition of the supremacy
of the individual. This was well stated by the Eisenhower
Commission on National Goals: "The first national goal to be
pursued . . . should be the development of each individual to
his fullest potential. . . . Self -fulfillment is placed at the sum-
mit. . . ." All other goods are relegated to lower orders of pri-
ority. . . ." But what conditions are most conducive to self-
fulfillment? Do the expressed and implied policies in this report
enhance the creation of a physical and social environment
compatible with human actualization? Too often they do not.
The following points will briefly illustrate why.

Work — We have become a very productive society but at
great expense to the fulfillment to be gained through our
work. Most people are now alienated from their work,
viewing it only as a means of acquiring the money to sat-
isfy other needs. The excessive specialization and division
of labor deprives the worker of a sense of completion and
purpose in his productive process.

Nature — Our manmade environments have isolated man
from his historical habitat and thus deprived him of an im-
portant life perspective. Whereas the agrarian environment
forced a realization of man's finitude in relation to the
ecologic totality of the earth, the urban environment al-
lows an arrogance of power since man is living in a world
of his own making. Seldom is there a sense that man has
not created all. The hubris engendered by this anthropo-
centric environmental perspective may help to explain our
current despoilation and disregard for that seemingly out-
side of man's created domain.

Community — In our search for personal identity through
goods acquired and occupational status achieved we have
been willing to move to wherever there were the greatest
economic opportunities. These high rates of geographic
mobility in search of social status have destroyed our
sense of community.

Family — with the transition to an urban-industrial econ-

304

omy we have had to forsake the extended family since it
was no longer an economically productive mechanism.
With its economic reason to exist undermined, the social
rationale was not sufficient to insure its continuity. With
further industrialization came specialized demands for
education and the traditional educational role of the fam-
ily was subsequently lost as well. Now, with further eco-
nomic "progress" we have a developing interest in child-
care centers for working mothers. Although I can grant
the pragmatic desirability of such institutions within an
urban-industrial context, it saddens me to think that we
may soon see the day when the last significant role of the
family — the love and warmth of the mother — will soon
disappear just as did the economic and educational roles.

In conclusion, as a rural-agrarian society, we had many of
the life style elements that we now look for in vain: Our sense
of belonging to, and finding identity in, the family and commu-
nity; knowing that there was understanding, concern, and com-
passion deep felt by our peers and neighbors; being able to
exert influence on the political and economic institutions of
our community and society. These parts of our lives and more
are being lost in our passion for affluence and in the over-
whelming surge of sheer numbers of people. Surely it is time
for those in control of our political and economic institutions,
our leaders, to begin to create conditions wherein the highest
qualities of human existence can more fully come to fruition.

I believe it was to this end that Dr. Lee A. DuBridge, then
President Nixon's science advisor, wrote: 'The prime task of
every human institution should be to halt population growth
. • . the first great challenge of our time is insuring that there
are no more births than deaths. Every human institution,
school, university, church, family, government, and interna-
tional agency, should get this as its prime task."

The Economy

The Commission asks, what effect will slowing population
growth have on the health of the economy? It concludes, with
minor exceptions, that slowing population growth will not be
detrimental to the economic interests of the American people.
The Commission does not ask what effect the American econ-
omy has on the noneconomic interests and values of the people
of this country and the world; a world increasingly char-
acterized by overcrowding, resource depletion, ecological

305

imbalances, and individual alienation. Put another way, is an
economic system predicated on the principles of productivity
and efficiency and characterized by ever-increasing concentra-
tion of the ownership of the means of production, capable of
responding to the individual's need for security, purpose, and
dignity? Is an economic system motivated by profit and ori-
ented to mass consumption as an end in itself capable of guard-
ing the values of individuality, family, and community?

While the Commission is correct in concluding that slowing
population growth will not necessarily prejudice economic in-
terests, there is considerable evidence to suggest that the system
itself is destructive of a broad range of values closely held by
the American people, including the job security of significant
numbers of people.

Unemployment will continue to be a difficult problem for
the next several years. The reason is that the rate of increase
in the supply of human resources will be high, and continuing
competitive pressure for efficiency will reduce demand for
labor per unit of work output.

The best predictor of the increase in the labor supply each
year is the number of people born about 20 years earlier. In
1950, about 3.65 million people were born in the United States,
and these people entered labor force pool about 20 years later,
in 1970. By 1955, births had increased to 4.13 million, so the
labor force will have to accommodate more new laborers in
1975 than in 1970 if the unemployment rate is to stay constant
at its present level. By 1957, births had reached 4.33, so by
1977, the labor force will have to accommodate an increase of
almost 20 percent over the number of new workers as in 1970.

The problem of absorbing this increasing number of new
workers into the labor force each year will be rendered particu-
larly difficult by the strong pressure for efficiency. Each year,
the work output per worker is expected to increase. This means
that the number of workers required for a given amount of
work is constantly dropping. Thus, at the very period in the
nation's history when a great many new jobs are required, the
pressure for efficiency is reducing the demand for new workers.

The magnitude of the drop in demand for workers over the
last several years is quite surprising.

For example, in 1950, scheduled air carriers employed 8.1
personnel for every million revenue passenger miles of trans-
portation provided. By 1968, only 2.6 personnel were em-
ployed to provide the same amount of transportation.

From 1950 to 1968, the number of men employed in the oil
and gas industries to deliver one quadrillion British Thermal
Units of energy dropped from 28.4 to 11.5.

306

From 1950 to 1969, the number of people employed on
farms to deliver 100 units of farm output decreased from 11.6
to 3.8.

The tremendous reduction in number of workers required
per unit of work delivered in all existing industries and busi-
nesses means that there must be a tremendous increase in the
number of new enterprises in the next 10 years if unemploy-
ment is to be kept at a level of six percent of the labor force.

The problem is compounded, because not only will there be
continuing reduction in the number of workers per unit work
output, but, in addition, there are a number of major industries
in which there will be a reduction in the amount of work out-
put, because of market saturation.

A particularly striking example is the aerospace industry. In
1970, the total number of jet aircraft used by all scheduled
airlines in the world was only about 5,000 Boeing 707 equiva-
lents. In 1972, at least seven major new models of large jet
aircraft are being manufactured in several countries. The
number of copies of these models that would have to be
produced in order for the manufacturers to yield to a rea-
sonable return on invested capital is very large. In fact, the
world jet fleet would have to be at least doubled from its
present size. Since load factors (percent of seats filled) in com-
mercial scheduled airlines had dropped to less than 50 percent
in the early 1970's, and domestic demand for seats only in-
creased two percent in 1971, it is difficult to see how demand
for new models of aircraft can hold up. Consequently, there
will probably be still more layoffs in the aerospace industry in
the next few years. This could have an important effect on the
entire economy, for two reasons. First, the industry uses about
60,000 workers for each new model of aircraft manufactured;
this is about one-tenth of one percent of the entire labor force.
Second, jet aircraft is the most important single export item of
the nation. Slackening of sales would intensify an already
deteriorating balance of trade situation.

These problems are compounded by the prospect of in-
creased costs resulting from environmental deterioration and
escalating demands on our social and political institutions.
What this suggests is that demographic trends, like environ-
mental pollution, impose costs that the market economy tradi-
tionally has externalized or failed to take into consideration.
That the present economic system is no longer representative
of the beneficial interests of the American people and in fact,
in conflict with the material conditions of the modern world,
should not be discounted.

307

Government

The Commission has asked: "Can government adapt to the
new realities and fragility of our existence as the pace of our
lives accelerates, the world grows more crowded, technology
multiplies life's complexities, and the environment is increas-
ingly threatened?" It concludes, ". . . slowing down the rate
of population growth would ease the problems facing gov-
ernment in the years ahead. . . ." This is not a particularly
responsive answer to the question posed. Perhaps the Com-
mission did not intend otherwise.

Government has been defined as, "that form of fundamental
rules and principles by which a nation or state is governed, or
by which individual members of a body politic are to regulate
their social action." Accordingly, the question posed by the
Commission cannot be answered by statistical projections or
cost benefit analysis. Rather, we must ask if the rules and prin-
ciples of government and social behavior are adequate to meet
both the just demands of the people and the dictates of demo-
graphic and ecological imperatives. This question can profit-
ably be viewed as three distinct inquiries.

First, what are the rules and principles of government in the
United States; or, in other words, what is government for. One
response to this question has been given by Arthur S. Miller
of the George Washington University Law faculty and a con-
tributor to the Commission's research project: "The raw mate-
rial of modern government is business, taxation, utility regula-
tion, agricultural control, labor relations, housing, banking and
finance, control of the security market — all our major domestic
issues — are phases of a single central problem: namely, the
interplay of economic enterprise in government. . . ." While
it cannot be denied that modern government undertakes pro-
grams to accomplish noneconomic objectives, it can readily be
seen that there is considerable truth in the observation that,
"the business of government is business." Indeed, the dominant
analytical perspective taken throughout this report supports a
predominantly economic interpretation of the role of govern-
ment.

The second question is to what ends are the rules and prin-
ciples of government applied. This can be answered in a
number of ways. For example, the ends can be equated with
"values." It is generally agreed that one of the primary stated
goals or values of government in the United States is the pro-
motion and enhancement of individual freedom for all the

308

people. Thus, the "government" pursues the goal of "freedom"
through the vehicle of the "free market" and the maintenance
of competitive economic conditions. Fundamental to this par-
ticular notion of "freedom" is a reliance on the "invisible hand"
or classical laissez-faire economics.

Another end or goal of the rules and principles of govern-
ment can be ascertained by analyzing the distribution of wealth
in society. By this standard, the end of "government" can rea-
sonably be understood as seeking to maximize the satisfactions
of the dominant forces in society, that is, the owners of the
means of production. However, it has been forcibly argued
by the sociologist Max Weber that freedom and wealth are, in
fact, one and the same:

The exact extent to which the total amount of 'freedom*
within a given legal community is actually increased de-
pends entirely upon the concrete economic order and
specifically on property distribution. In no case can it be
simply deduced from the content of the law.

The final question is, can the present political economy
(government) of the United States cope with the demands
presently being placed upon it. A. E. Keir Nash, formerly a
director of research and now a consultant for the Commission,
responded to this question as follows:

There is good reason to doubt the capacity of the Ameri-
can governmental system to accommodate a third 100
million citizens in the final decades of the 20th century.
There are strong grounds for doubting the ability of the
government both to maintain political order and to attain
social justice among a citizenry of 300 million.

Dr. Nash goes on to note two fundamental failures of Ameri-
can government. First, is an historical failure to fulfill its
basic promises of freedom and equality. Second, is the failure
of government, "to shift government actions — so as to make
them appropriate to the increasingly crowded world in which
we live."

Legislative and executive policymaking continues largely
to be based upon log-rolling and incremental solutions to
problems in the society and the economy which are not
genuine solutions at all. Such a pseudo-problem-solving
may work respectably when the basic structures of the
economy, the society and the environment are not in flux.

309

They may be admirable in a largely empty and unsettled
country, half slave and half free. Yet they are wholly
unsuited to the problems which confront Americans to-
day. The politics of yesterday is simply not suited to the
needs of tomorrow.

The Commission chose to reject the evidence militating
toward this conclusion. I cannot.

310

Separate Statement of Howard D. Samuel

Although I fully share the goals ending discrimination and
providing equal opportunity for women, I disagree that passage
of the Equal Rights Amendment would be a useful step in that
direction. On the one hand, the Equal Rights Amendment
would accomplish very little for women; what is needed is a
specific body of legislation, federal and state, to end discrimi-
natory practices and open up opportunity. On the other hand,
the Equal Rights Amendment would have a destructive effect
in that it would render invalid present state laws protecting
women — particularly women workers — against certain kinds
of injustice and hardship. For this reason, I do not support the
recommendation endorsing the Equal Rights Amendment

311

Separate Statement of George D. Woods

I believe the Commission should leave decisions on the
amounts of funds necessary to the proper authorities. Such
amounts may be either lesser or greater than those recom-
mended in these sections.

312

REFERENCES

Chapter 2. Population Growth

1. Ansley J. Coale, "Alternative Paths to a Stationary Pop-
ulation" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

2. U.S. National Center for Health Statistics, Vital Statis-
tics of the United States, Volume I, Natality, 1968.

3. U.S. National Center for Health Statistics, Vital Statis-
tics of the United States, Volume II, Section 5, Life
Tables, 1968.

4. James Mooney, "The Aboriginal Population of America
North of Mexico," Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collec-
tion, 1928, Vol. 80, No. 7.

5. Irene B. Taeuber, "Growth of the Population of the
United States in the Twentieth Century" (prepared for
the Commission, 1972).

6. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports,
Series P-23, No. 36, "Fertility Indicators: 1970," 1971.

7. U. S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports,
Series P-20, No. 232, "Birth Expectations Data: June
1971," 1972.

8. See note 1.

9. National Education Association, NEA Research Bulletin,
1971, Vol. 49, No. 3.

10. Estimates developed from Census Bureau data on the
population by age, 1960 and 1970, and data on the vol-
ume of arrests for crime index offenses as reported for
1960 and 1970 in U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation,

315

Uniform Crime Reports — 1 970, by direct standardiza-
tion methods.
11. Denis F. Johnston, "Illustrative Projections of the Labor
Force of the United States to 2040" (prepared for the
Commission, 1972).

Chapter 3. Population Distribution

1. Philip M. Hauser, in hearings before the Commission,
Chicago, Illinois, June 21-22, 1971.

2. Irene B. Taeuber, "The Changing Distribution of the
Population of the United States in the Twentieth Cen-
tury" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

3. Jerome P. Pickard, "U.S. Metropolitan Growth and
Expansion, 1970-2000, With Population Projections"
(prepared for the Commission, 1972).

4. See note 2. Also, U.S. Bureau of the Census, Census of
Population and Housing: 1970, General Demographic
Trends for Metropolitan Areas, 1960 to 1970, Final Re-
port PHC(2), 197U

5. See note 2.

6. U.S. Bureau of the Census, "Regional Metropolitan
Projections" (special tabulations prepared for the Com-
mission).

7. U. S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports,
Series P-20, No. 210, "Mobility of the Population of the
United States: March 1969 to March 1970," 1971.

8. See note 4.

9. See note 2.

10. See note 4.

11. William Alonso, "The System of Intermetropolitan Pop-
ulation Flows" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

12. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Census of Population: 1970,
Number of Inhabitants, Final Report PC(1), 1971.

13. U.S. Department of Agriculture, The Economic and So-
cial Condition of Rural America in the 1970's (prepared
for the Senate Committee on Government Operations,
1971).

14. Mariah Gilmore, in hearings before the Commission,
Little Rock, Arkansas, June 7-8, 1971.

15. The impact of rural repopulation was determined by sub-
tracting the resident population of the United States in
1970 from a hypothetical population wherein all coun-
ties in the country had been repopulated to their his-
torical maximum. This figure was adjusted to remove

316

some of the bias attributable to the exodus from some of
our central cities, since our intent was to focus on the
effects of rural repopulation only. It was found that rural
repopulation under the conditions described above would
absorb no more than 11 million people, or about five
years worth of national growth as projected under the
2-child family assumption.

Glenn V. Fuguitt, "Population Trends of Nonmetro-
politan Cities and Villages in the United States" (pre-
pared for the Commission, 1972).

Ira S. Lowry, "Housing Assistance for Low-Income Ur-
ban Families: A Fresh Approach" (prepared for the
House Committee on Banking and Currency, 1971).
See note 4.
See note 6.

George Romney, Secretary of the Department of Hous-
ing and Urban Development (address to Metropolitan
Washington Council of Governments, 1971).
National Public Opinion Survey conducted for the Com-
mission by the Opinion Research Corporation, 1971.
James J. Zuiches and Glen V. Fuguitt, "Residential Pref-
erences: Implications for Population Redistribution in
Nonmetropolitan Areas" (prepared for the 138th Meet-
ing of the American Association for the Advancement
of Science, Philadelphia, 1971).
See note 21.
See note 3.
See note 6.

Edward E. Murray and Ned Hege, "Growth Center Pop-
ulation Redistribution 1980-2000" (prepared for the
Commission, 1972).
See note 3.
See note 21.

Chapter 4. The Economy

1. U.S. Bureau of the Census, "Projections of Family In-
come to the Year 2000" (unpublished tabulations pre-
pared at the request of the Commission). These Census
tabulations, which also provide estimates of per capita
income, were developed in part from projections of the
Gross National Product prepared at the request of the
Commission by the Office of Business Economics, Depart-
ment of Commerce. Both the family income and GNP
projections utilized labor force projections from a paper

317

prepared for the Commission by Denis F. Johnston of the
Bureau of Labor Statistics.

2. These data were derived from projections of the Gross
National Product prepared for the Commission by the
Office of Business Economics (see note 1).

3. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports
Series P-60, No. 81, "Characteristics of the Low-Income
Population, 1970," 1971.

4. Denis F. Johnston, "Illustrative Projections of the Labotf
Force of the United States to 2040" (prepared for the
Commission, 1972).

5. John A. Howard and Donald R. Lehman, "The Effect of
Different Populations on Selected Industries in the Yea
2000" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

6. Robert O. Anderson, "Population, Productivity, and thej
Environment," in hearings before the Commission, New )
York, September 28, 1971.

7. Irene B. Taeuber, "Growth of the Population of the
United States in the Twentieth Century" (prepared for the]
Commission, 1972).

8. Edgar M. Hoover, "Reduced Population Growth and the 1
Problems of Urban Area" (prepared for the Commis- j
sion, 1972).

Chapter 5. Resources and the Environment

Nearly all of the source material for this chapter came from
the resource and environmental research done for the Commis-
sion by Resources for the Future, Inc. Their work includes a
summary chapter on the resource and environmental conse-
quences of population growth in the United States by Ronald
G. Ridker, as well as more detailed supporting work which
includes an analysis of pollution, recycling, adequacy of non-
fuel minerals, energy, outdoor recreation, agriculture, water
supplies, and urban scale.

1. James G. Edinger, in hearings before the Commission,
Los Angeles, May 4, 1971.

2. Paul R. Ehrlich and John P. Holdren, "One-Dimensional
Ecology," Science and Public Affairs, Spring, 1972, forth-
coming.

318

Chapter 6. Government

1. Jack Appleman, William P. Butz, David H. Greenberg,
Paul L. Jordan, and Anthony H. Pascal, "Population
Change and Public Resource Requirements: The Impact
of Future United States Demographic Trends on Educa-
tion, Welfare and Health Care" (prepared for the Com-
mission, 1972).

2. John G. Grumm, "Population Change and State Govern-
ment Policy" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

3. Michael N. Danielson, "Differentiation, Segregation, and
Political Fragmentation in the American Metropolis"
(prepared for the Commission, 1972).

4. Robert F. Drury, "Local Governments and Population
Change" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

5. National Public Opinion Survey conducted for the Com-
mission by the Opinion Research Corporation, 1971.

6. Roy W. Bahl, Jr., "Metropolitan Fiscal Structures and the
Distribution of Population Within Metropolitan Areas"
(prepared for the Commission, 1972).

7. Richard Lehne, "Population Change and Congressional
Representation" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).
Also, Roger H. Davidson, "Population Change and Rep-
resentational Government" (prepared for the Commis-
sion, 1972).

8. Kenneth N. Vines, "Population Increase and the Adminis-
tration of Justice" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

9. The Report of the President* s Commission on an All-
Volunteer Armed Force, 1970.

10. A.F.K. Organski, Alan Lamborn, and Bruno Bueno de
Mesquita, "The Effective Population in International Poli-
tics" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

11. William Alonso, "Problems, Purposes, and Implicit Poli-
cies for a National Strategy of Urbanization" (prepared
for the Commission, 1972).

12. Allen D. Manvel, "Metropolitan Growth and Govern-
mental Fragmentation (prepared for the Commission,
1972).

13. Dorn C. McGrath, Jr., "Population Growth and Change:
Implications for Planning" (prepared for the Commis-
sion, 1972).

14. Lawrence B. Christmas, in hearings before the Commis-
sion, Chicago, Illinois, June 21-22, 1971.

319

15. Tom Bradley, in hearings before the Commission, Los
Angeles, California, May 3, 1971.

Chapter 7. Social Aspects

1. Lincoln H. Day, "The Social Consequences of a Zero
Population Growth Rate in the United States" (prepared
for the Commission, 1972).

2. U. S. National Center for Health Statistics, Vital Statistics
of the United States, Volume II, Section 5, Life Tables,
1968. Excludes immigration.

3. The 1970 data and population projections used through-
out this chapter are drawn from U. S. Bureau of the
Census, Current Population Reports, Series P-25, No.
470, "Projections of the Population of the United States
by Age and Sex: 1970 to 2000."

4. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Historical Abstract of the
United States, Colonial Times to 1957, 1960.

5. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports,
Series P-60, No. 81, "Characteristics of the Low-Income
Population, 1970," 1971.

6. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Census of Population and
Housing: 1970, General Population Characteristics: U.S.
Summary, Final Report PC(1)-B1.

7. See note 2.

8. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports,
Series P-20, No. 212, "Marital Status and Family Status:
March 1970," 1971.

9. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports,
Series P-20, No. 223, "Social and Economic Variations
in Marriage, Divorce, and Remarriage: 1967," 1971.

10. Luman H. Long, ed., The 1972 World Almanac and Book
of Facts (New York: Newspaper Enterprise Association,
Inc., for The Washington Daily News, 1971).

11. See note 9.

12. Kingsley Davis, "The American Family in Relation to
Demographic Change" (prepared for the Commission,
1972).

13. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Census of Population and
Housing, for 1970 and 1960, Number of Inhabitants:
U.S. Summary, Final Report PC(1)-A1.

14. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Census of Population and
Housing: 1970, Number of Inhabitants: New York, Final
Report PC(1)-A34.

15. U.S. National Institute of Mental Health, "Psycho-

320

Ecological Aspects of Population," by John B. Calhoun,
1966.

Jonathan L. Freedman, "A Positive View of Population
Density," Psychology Today, September 1971.
Jonathan L. Freedman, "Population Density, Juvenile
Delinquency, and Mental Illness in New York City"
(prepared for the Commission, 1972).
These estimates are based on the number of children ever
born to 35- to 44-year-old women according to their
ethnic origin (U. S. Bureau of the Census, Current Pop-
ulation Reports, Series P-20, No. 226, "Fertility Varia-
tions by Ethnic Origin: November 1969," 1971). The
number of children theoretically required for replacement
was calculated by multiplying the number of women in
each ethnic group by 2.07 (the average number of chil-
dren per woman 35 to 44 consistent with completed fer-
tility at the replacement level) . This "hypothetical" num-
ber of children was then subtracted from the actual num-
ber of children born to women in each ethnic group, to
estimate fertility in excess of replacement needs.
The data for poor and nonpoor women were developed
in the same manner (see note 18), utilizing U. S. Bureau
of the Census, Current Population Reports, Series P-20,
No. 211, "Previous and Prospective Fertility: 1967,"
1971. Partly estimated.

Births throughout the sixties (1960-1968), were obtained
from the U.S. National Center for Health Statistics,
Vital Statistics of the United States, Volume I, Natality,
and subtracted from the total January 1, 1969 popula-
tion to determine their relative impact. Spanish-origin
births were estimated.

U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports,
Series P-23, No. 36, "Fertility Indicators: 1970," 1971.
On this point and others in this section, see Reynolds
Farley, "Fertility and Mortality Trends Among Blacks
in the United States" (prepared for the Commission,
1972).

Benjamin Bradshaw, "Some Aspects of the Fertility of
Mexican-Americans" (prepared for the Commission,
1972).

Dr. Eugene S. Callender, in hearings before the Commis-
sion, New York, September 27-28, 1971.
Naomi Gray, in hearings before the Commission, Wash-
ington, D.C., April 14-15, 1971.

Manuel Aragon, in hearings before the Commission, Los
Angeles, California, May 3-4, 1971.

321

26. Rev. Jesse Jackson, in hearings before the Commission,
Chicago, Illinois, June 21-22, 1971.

27. National Public Opinion Survey conducted for the Com-
mission by the Opinion Research Corporation, 1971.

28. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports,
Series P-60, No. 80, "Income in 1970 of Families an<
Persons in the U. S.," 1971.

29. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports,
Series P-20, No. 224, "Selected Characteristics of Per-
sons and Families of Mexican, Puerto Rican, and Other
Spanish Origin: March 1971," 1971.

30. Irene B. Taeuber, "Growth of the Population of the
United States in the Twentieth Century" (prepared for
the Commission, 1972).

31. See notes 2 and 4.

32. Robert E. Roberts and Cornelius Askew, "A Considera-
tion of Mortality in Three Subcultures" (paper presented
at the annual meeting of the Population Association of
America, Washington, D. C, 1971).

33. U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare,
"Natality and Mortality of American Indians Compared
with U. S. Whites and Nonwhites," by Charles Hill and
Mozart Spector, in HSMHA Health Reports, March
1971.

34. Evelyn M. Kitagawa, "Socioeconomic Differences in
Mortality in the United States and Some Implications for
Population Policy" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

35. Sonny Walker, in hearings before the Commission, Little
Rock, Arkansas, June 7-8, 1971.

36. Irene B. Taeuber, "The Changing Distribution of the
Population of the U.S. in the Twentieth Century" (pre-
pared for the Commission, 1972).

Chapter 8. Population and Public Policy

1. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports,
Series P-23, No. 36, "Fertility Indicators: 1970," 1971.

2. Estimated from data on population 65 to 74 years old,
and survival rates, in U.S. Bureau of the Census, Cur-
rent Population Reports, Series P-25, No. 470, "Pro-
jections of the Population of the United States, by Age
and Sex: 1970 to 2020," 1971.

3. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Re-
ports, Series P-60, No. 81, "Characteristics of the Low-
Income Population, 1970," 1971.

322

Chapter 9. Education

1. National Public Opinion Survey conducted for the Com-
mission by the Opinion Research Corporation, 1971.

2. Stephen Viederman, "Population Education in the Ele-
mentary and Secondary Schools of the United States"
(prepared for the Commission, 1972).

3. Sue T. Reid and Alan P. Bates, "Undergraduate So-
ciology Programs in Accredited Colleges and Universi-
ties, " American Sociologist, May 1971, Vol. 6.

4. Ritchie H. Reed and Susan Mcintosh, "Costs of Chil-
dren" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

5. Jane A. Menken, "Teenage Childbearing: Its Medical
Aspects and Implications for the United States Popula-
tion" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

6. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports
Series P-20, No. 223, "Social and Economic Variations
in Marriage, Divorce and Remarriage: 1967," 1971.

7. White House Conference on Children, Report to the
President, 1970.

8. See note 7.

9. Barry M. Popkin, "Economic Benefits from the Elimi-
nation of Hunger in America," Discussion Paper No. 102-
71 (University of Wisconsin, Institute for Research on
Poverty, 1971).

10. F. Glen Loyd, "Finally, Facts on Malnutrition in the
United States," Todays Health, September 1969.

11. Heinz F. Eichenwald and Peggy Crooke Fry, "Nutrition
and Learning," Science, September 1970, Vol. 163.

12. Curt Stern, "The Place of Genetics in Medicine," An-
nals of Internal Medicine, October 1971, Vol. 75, No. 4.

13. This information was contained in a background mem-
orandum from Joseph D. Beasley, M.D.

14. Sol Gordon, "Family Planning Education for Adoles-
cents" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

15. Elizabeth Hendryson, "The Case for Sex Education,"
The PTA Magazine, May 1969.

16. Interfaith Commission on Marriage and Family Life,
Inter faith Statement on Sex Education, 1968.

17. The Report of the Commission on Obscenity and Pornog-
graphy, September 1970.

18. See note 17.

19. Hariette Surovell in hearings before the Commission,
New York, September 27-28, 1971.

323

20. John F. Kantner and Melvin Zelnik, "Sexuality, Contra-
ception, and Pregnancy Among Pre-Adult Females in
the United States" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

21. U. S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports,
Series P-23, No. 36, "Fertility Indicators: 1970," 1971.

22. Joe Blount, National Communicable Disease Center, At-
lanta, Georgia, unpublished data.

23. See note 17.

Chapter 10. The Status of Children and Women

1. U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare,
Maternal and Child Health Service, Promoting the\
Health of Mothers and Children, FY 1971.

2. Charlotte F. Muller and Frederick S. Jaffe, "Financing
Fertility-Related Health Services in the United States,
1972-1978, A Preliminary Projection," Family Planning
Perspectives, January 1972.

3. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Children of Women in
the Labor Force, March 1970, Special Labor Force Re-
port 134, 1971.

4. White House Conference on Children, Report to the
President, 1970.

5. Based on per child estimates contained in U. S. Congress,
Senate, Committee on Labor and Public Welfare, Eco-
nomic Opportunity Amendments of 1971, S. Rept. 92-
331, to accompany S. 2007, 92nd Cong., 1st sess., 1971.

6. Revenue Act of 1971, P.L. 92-178.

7. Jane Menken, "Teenage Childbearing: Its Medical As-
pects and Implications for the U. S. Population" (pre-
pared for the Commission, 1972). Also, U. S. National
Center for Health Statistics, Vital Statistics of the United
States, Volume I, Natality, 1968.

8. Philip J. Keeve, M.D., "Fertility Experience of Juvenile
Girls: A Community-Wide 10 Year Study" (paper pre-
sented to the American Public Health Association, De-
troit, Michigan, November 12, 1968).

9. Commissioner Sidney P. Marland, Office of Education,
speaking before Conference on Improving Services to
School -Age Parents, Florida, December 1971.

10. U. S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports,
Series P-23, No. 36, "Fertility Indicators: 1970," 1971.

11. "Bastards," American Jurisprudence 2nd, Volume 10,
sec. 62.

12. United Nations, Study of Discrimination Against Persons

324

Born Out-of -Wedlock, by V. Saario, 1967.

13. Social Security Act, 64 Stat. 492, 42 U.S.C. sec. 416(H)
(3) (1965).

14. The analysis of adoption is developed from information
available from the U. S. Dept. of Health, Education and
Welfare, National Center for Social Statistics and Na-
tional Center for Health Statistics.

15. See note 10.

16. National Public Opinion Survey conducted for the Com-
mission by the Opinion Research Corporation, 1971.

17. Judith Blake, "Coercive Pronatalism and American Pop-
ulation Policy" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

18. U. S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics,
Marital and Family Characteristics of Workers, March
1970, Special Labor Force Report 130, 1971.

19. U. S. Bureau of the Census, Census of Population: 1960,
Women by Number of Children Ever Born, Final Re-
port PC(2)-3A.

20. U.S. Department of Labor, 1969 Handbook of Women
Workers, Women's Bureau Bulletin No. 294; Negro
Women in the Population and in the Labor Force, De-
cember 1967.

21. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Marital and Family
Characteristics of Workers, March 1971, Special Labor
Force Report, September 1971.

22. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Why Women Start and
Stop Working, A Study in Mobility, Special Labor Force
Report 59, September 1965.

23. See note 21.

24. Jeanne Clare Ridley, "Family Planning and the Status of
Women in the United States" (unpublished) and U. S.
Department of Health, Education and Welfare, Office of
Education, Earned Degrees Conferred: 1969-1970, Sum-
mary Data, by Mary Evans Hooper.

25. U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare,
Report of the Women's Action Program, January 1972.

26. The President's Task Force on Women's Rights and
Responsibilities, A Matter of Simple Justice, April 1970.

27. Elliott Morss, "The Influence of Federal Government
Activities on the Family Decision to Have a Child" (pre-
pared for the Commission, 1972).

28. John T. Noonan, Jr., and Mary Cynthia Dunlap, "Un-
intended Consequences: Laws Indirectly Affecting Pop-
ulation Growth in the United States" (prepared for the
Commission, 1972).

325

29. U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare,
National Center for Social Statistics, Findings of the
1969 AFDC Study: Data by Census Division and Se\
lee ted States, Part I: Demographic Program Character^
istics, NCSS Report AFDC-3(67) July 1970, and NCSS]
Report AFDC-3(69) December 1970.

30. Telephone conversation with Jule M. Sugarman, Human,
Resources Administrator and Commissioner of Social
Services, New York.

31. These proposals are discussed in Daniel Callahan, "Ethics,
Population, and the American Tradition" (prepared for
the Commission, 1972).

Chapter 11. Human Reproduction

1. 1970 National Fertility Study conducted by Office of Pop- j
ulation Research, Princeton University. See Norman B.
Ryder and Charles F. Westoff, Reproduction in the\
United States: 1965 (Princeton: Princeton University]
Press, 1971).

2. Hans Forssman and Inga Thuwe, "One hundred and twen- j
ty children born after application for therapeutic abortion j
refused," Acta Psychiat. Scand., 1966.

3. President's Message on Population, July 18, 1969.

4. U.S. National Center for Health Statistics, Vital Statistics S
Rates in the United States, 1940-1960, 1968. Current fig- j
ures were obtained from the Statistical Research Section, j
Division of Vital Statistics, National Center for Health ]
Statistics.

5. Jane A. Menken, "Teenage Childbearing: Its Medical As- j
pects and Implications for the U.S. Population" (pre- ]
pared for the Commission, 1972).

6. Harriet Pilpel and Peter Ames, "Legal Obstacles to Free-
dom of Choice in the Areas of Contraception, Abortion,
and Voluntary Sterilization in the United States" (pre- j
pared for the Commission, 1972).

7. Harriet Pilpel and N. F. Wechsler, "Birth Control, Teen-
Agers and the Law: A New Look, 1971," Family Plan-
ning Perspectives, 1971, Vol. 3, No. 3.

8. See note 1. Also Harriet Presser and Larry Bumpass,
"Demographic and Social Aspects of Contraceptive Steri-
lization in the United States: 1965-1970" (prepared for
the Commission, 1972.)

9. See note 6, and Cyril C. Means, Jr., "The Law of New
York Concerning Abortion and the Status of the Foetus,

326

1664-1968: A Case of Cessation of Constitutionality,"
14 New York Law Forum 411 (1968). As a New York
court has recently observed: "It is generally believed that
abortion of a quick child was a high crime at Common
Law . . . although one commentator has argued per-
suasively that, in fact, it was not, that abortion was a
purely ecclesiastical offence punishable only by spiritual
penalties and that the secular crime of abortion was cre-
ated by the imagination of Sir Edward Coke who felt
strongly that abortion after quickening should be punish-
able and that the purely spiritual penalties of the ecclesi-
astical courts would not deter the people from it. (See,
generally, Means, 'The Phoenix of Abortional Freedom:
Is a penumbral or Ninth-Amendment Right About to
Arise from the Nineteenth-Century Legislative Ashes of
a Fourteenth-Century Common-Law Liberty?' 17 [New
York Law Forum 335 (1971)])." Byrn v. N.Y. City
Health and Hosp. Corp. 167 New York Law Journal No.
39, p. 5, col. 1 (N.Y. App. Div., 2d Dep't. February 24,
1972).

Daniel Callahan, "Abortion: A Summary of the Argu-
ments" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).
City of New York Health Services Administration, Bulle-
tin on Abortion Program, December 1971.
Gordon Chase, in hearings before the Commission, New
York, September 27-28, 1971.

Personal communication from Karl Tyler, National Com-
municable Disease Center, Atlanta, Georgia.
James W. Brackett, "The Demographic Consequences of
Legal Abortion," in Abortion, Obtained and Denied Re-
search Approaches, Sidney H. Newman, Mildred B. Beck,
and Sarah Lewit, eds. (New York: The Population Coun-
cil, 1971).

Christopher Tietze, "The Potential Impact of Legal Abor-
tion on Population Growth in the United States" (pre-
pared for the Commission, 1972).

Elise F. Jones and Charles F. Westoff, "Attitudes Toward
Abortion in the United States in 1970 and the Trend Since
1965" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).
National Public Opinion Survey conducted for the Com-
mission by the Opinion Research Corporation, 1971.
Some of the material in this section is based on Sheldon
Segal, "Possible Means of Fertility Control: Distant or
Near" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).
U.S. Congress, Senate, "Report of the Secretary of HEW,
Submitting Five- Year Plan for Family Planning Services

327

and Population Research Programs," prepared for the
Special Subcommittee on Human Resources of the Senate
Committee on Labor and Public Welfare, October, 1971.;

20. Carl Djerassi, "Birth Control After 1984," Science, Sep-
tember 4, 1970.

21. Estimated from "Population Research: A Prospectus,"
Committee Report to the Assistant Secretary for Health
and Scientific Affairs, U.S. Department of Health, Educa-
tion and Welfare. Reprimand in U.S. Congress, House,
Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce, Family
Planning Services, Hearings before the Subcommittee on
Public Health and Welfare, 91st Cong., 2nd sess., August
3, 4, and 7, 1970, p. 162. Also from Oscar Harkavy and
John Maier, "Research Conducted in Contraception and
Reproduction," Family Planning Perspectives, July, 1971.

22. Title IV and X, Public Health Service Act as amended,
242 U.S.C. 281-289c and 42 U.S.C. 201.

23. U. S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare, Pop-
ulation and Family Planning, Report of the President's
Committee on Population and Family Planning, Novem-
ber, 1968. And also, "Population Research: A Prospec-
tus" (note 21).

24. See note 19.

25. See note 21.

26. Estimate as of January 1, 1972, based on projections in
Five- Year Plan (see note 19). Much of the material in
this section is based on Frederick S. Jaffe, "Family Plan-
ning Services in the United States" (prepared for the
Commission, 1972).

27. See note 19.

28*. Sec. 59.5, Fed. Reg. Doc. 71-13560, filed 9-14-71.

29. Material in this section is taken from Charlotte F. Muller
and Frederick S. Jaffe, "Financing Fertility-Related Ser-
vices in the United States, 1972-1978: A Preliminary Pro-
jection," Family Planning Perspectives, January, 1972.

30. See note 19.

31. John F. Kantner and Melvin Zelnik, "Sexuality, Contra-
ception, and Pregnancy Among Pre- Adult Females in the
United States" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

32. See note 11.

33. Sol Gordon, "Family Planning Education for Adoles-
cents" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

34. See note 17.

328

Chapter 12. Population Stabilization

1. Norman B. Ryder, "A Demographic Optimum Projec-
tion for the United States" (prepared for the Commis-
sion, 1972). Also Ansley J. Coale, "Alternative Paths to
a Stationary Population" (prepared for the Commission,
1972).

2. Tomas Frejka, "Demographic Paths to a Stationary
Population; The U.S. in International Comparison" (pre-
pared for the Commission, 1972); and, "Reflections on
the Demographic Conditions Needed to Establish a U.S.
Stationary Population Growth," Population Studies,
November 1968.

3. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports,
Series P-23, No. 36, "Fertility Indicators: 1970," 1971.

4. See Ryder, note 1.

5. Jane A. Menken, "Teenage Childbearing: Its Medical
Aspects and Implications for the United States Popula-
tion" (prepared for the Commission, 1972).

6. National Public Opinion Survey conducted for the Com-
mission by the Opinion Research Corporation, 1971.

7. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Re-
ports, Series P-20, No. 212, "Marital Status and Family
Status: March 1970," 1971.

8. Christopher Tietze, "The Potential Impact of Legal
Abortion on Population Growth in the United States"
(prepared for the Commission, 1972).

9. Michael Teitelbaum, "International Experience with
Fertility at or Near Replacement Level" (prepared for
the Commission, 1972).

0. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports,
Series P-25, No. 470, "Projections of the Population of
the United States, by Age and Sex: 1970 to 2020," 1971.

1. Judith Blake, "Coercive Pronatalism and Population
Policy" (prepared for the Commission, 1972), and other
papers cited above in discussion of institutional pres-
sures.

2. Ellen Peck, in hearings before the Commission, Chicago,
Illinois, June 21-22, 1971.

3. The Population Council, "Japan: Interim Report of the
Population Problems Inquiry Council," Studies in Family
Planning, No. 56, August 1970. See also note 10.

329

Chapter 13. Immigration

1. Irene B. Taeuber, "Growth of the Population of th<
United States in the Twentieth Century" (prepared foi
the Commission, 1972). For this chapter, see also
Charles B. Keely, "Immigration: Considerations on
Trends, Prospects, and Policy" (prepared for the Com«
mission, 1972).

2. See note 1.

3. Richard Irwin and Robert Warren, "Demographic
Aspects of American Immigration" (prepared for the
Commission, 1972).

4. U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, 1971 An-
nual Report of the Immigration and Naturalization
Service.

5. See note 3.

6. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports,
Series P-25, No. 470, "Projections of the Population of
the United States, by Age and Sex: 1970 to 2020," 1971.

7- Ansley J. Coale, "Alternative Paths to a Stationary
Population" (paper prepared for the Commission, 1972).

8. U.S. Bureau of the Census, "Regional Metropolitan
Projections" (special tabulations prepared for the Com-
mission).

9. See note 4.

10. See note 4.

11. J. N. Haug and B. C. Martin, Foreign Medical Gradu-
ates, American Medical Association, 1971. On profes-
sional immigration, see also Judith Fortney, "Immigra-
tion Into the United States With Special Reference to
Professional and Technical Workers" (prepared for the
Commission, 1972).

12. Estimate based on figures appearing in: U. S. Bureau of
the Census, Statistical Abstract of the United States: 1970.

Chapter 14. National Distribution and Migration
Policies

This chapter draws primarily on the following papers pre-
pared for the Commission:

William Alonso, "Problems, Purposes, and Implicit Policies
for a National Strategy of Urbanization."

330

Gordon Cameron, "The Relevance to the United States of
British and French Regional Population Strategies."
Michael Danielson, "Differentiation, Segregation, and Politi-
cal Fragmentation in the American Metropolis."
Niles M. Hansen, "The Case for Government-Assisted Migra-
tion."

Edgar M. Hoover, "Policy Objectives for Population Dis-
tribution."

Allen Manvel, "Metropolitan Growth and Governmental
Fragmentation. "

Dorn C. McGrath, Jr., "Population Growth and Change: Im-
plications for Planning."

Peter A. Morrison, "Dimensions of the Population Problem
in the United States"; "Population Movements: Where the
Public and Private Interests Conflict"; and "Population Move-
ments and the Shape of Urban Growth: Implications for
•Public Policy."

Chapter 15. Population Statistics and Research

1. "Population Research: A Prospectus," Committee Re-
port to the Assistant Secretary for Health and Scientific
Affairs, U.S. Department of Health, Education and Wel-
fare. Reprinted in U.S. Congress, House, Committee on
Interstate and Foreign Commerce, Family Planning
Services, Hearings before the Subcommittee on Public
Health and Welfare, 91st Cong., 2nd sess., August 3,
4, and 7, 1970, p. 162.

2. See note 1.

Chapter 16. Organizational Changes

This chapter draws primarily on the following:

U.S. Congress, Senate, Committee on Labor and Public Wel-
fare, Expanding, Improving, and Better Coordinating the
Family Planning Services and Population Research Activities
of the Federal Government, S. Rept. 91-1004, To Accompany
S.2108, 91st Cong., 2nd sess., 1970.

U.S. Congress, Senate, Committee on Labor and Public Wel-
fare, Full Opportunity Act, Hearings before the Special Sub-
committee on Evaluation and Planning of Social Problems,
on S.5, 91st Cong., 1st and 2nd sess., July 7, 8, 10, 18; De-
cember 18, 1969; and March 13, 1970.

331

U.S. Congress, Senate, Committee on Labor and Public Wei- ]
fare, Full Opportunity and National Goals and Priorities Act, 1
Hearings before the Special Subcommittee on Evaluation and ]
Planning of Social Programs, on S.5, 92nd Cong., 1st sess., ]
July 13, 1971.

U.S. Executive Office of the President, Papers Relating to ]
the President's Departmental Reorganization Program, A :
Reference Compilation, March 1971.

U.S. Dept. of Health, Education and Welfare, Toward a So-
cial Report, January 1969.

332

APPENDIX

RESEARCH PAPERS

Alonso, William

Institute of Urban and Regional Development and Depart-
ment of City and Regional Planning, University of Cali-
fornia, Berkeley

Problems, Purposes, and Implicit Policies for a National
Strategy of Urbanization

The System of Intermetropolitan Population Flows

Appleman, Jack, William P. Blitz, David H. Greenberg, Paul

L. Jordan, and Anthony H. Pascal
Rand Corporation
Population Change and Public Resource Requirements: The

Impact of Future United States Demographic Trends on

Education, Welfare, and Health Care

Ayres, Robert U., and Ivars Gutmanis
International Research and Technology Corporation
Technological Change, Pollution and Treatment Cost Coeffi-
cients in Input-Output Analysis

Bachrach, Peter

Department of Political Science, Temple University

and
Elihu Bergman

Center for Population Studies, Harvard University
Participation and Conflict in Making American Population

Policy: A Critical Analysis

335

Bahl, Roy W., Jr. '

Department of Economics, Syracuse University
Metropolitan Fiscal Structures and the Distribution of Popu-
lation Within Metropolitan Areas

Beale, Calvin L.

Economic Research Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture
Rural and Nonmetropolitan Population Trends of Significance
to National Population Policy

Berry, Brian J. L.

Center for Urban Studies, University of Chicago
Population Growth in the Daily Urban Systems of the United
States, 1980-2000

Blake, Judith

Department of Demography, University of California, Ber-
keley
Coercive Pronatalism and American Population Policy

Bollinger, W. LaMar

Department of Economics, College of Idaho
The Economic and Social Impact of the Depopulation Process
Upon Four Selected Counties in Idaho

Bradshaw, Benjamin S.

Population Research Center, University of Texas

Some Aspects of the Fertility of Mexican- Americans

Cain, Glen G.

Department of Economics, University of Wisconsin
The Effect of Income Maintenance Laws on Fertility in the
United States

Callahan, Daniel, ed.

Institute of Society, Ethics and the Life Sciences

Ethics , Population, and the American Tradition

Cameron, Gordon

Department of Applied Economics, University of Glasgow
The Relevance to the United States of British and French Re-
gional Population Strategies

Carr, A. Barry, and David W. Culver

Economic Research Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture

Agriculture, Population, and the Environment

Christmas, Lawrence Barroll

Northeastern Illinois Planning Commission

Continued Metropolitanization: The Chicago Experience

336

Cicchetti, Charles J.

Resources for the Future, Inc.

Outdoor Recreation and Congestion in the United States

Coale, Ansley J.

Office of Population Research, Princeton University

Alternative Paths to a Stationary Population

Commoner, Barry

Center for the Biology of Natural Systems, Washington Uni-
versity
The Environmental Cost of Economic Growth

Cutright, Phillips

Department of Sociology, Indiana University

Illegitimacy in the United States: 1920-1968

Danielson, Michael N.

Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs,

Princeton University
Differentiation, Segregation, and Political Fragmentation in

the American Metropolis

Darmstadter, Joel

Resources for the Future, Inc.

Energy

David, Henry P.

Transnational Family Research Institute, American Institutes

for Research; and Preterm Institute
Unwanted Pregnancies: Costs and Alternatives

Davidson, Roger H.

Department of Political Science, University of California,

Santa Barbara
Population Change and Representative Government

Davis, Kingsley

International Population and Urban Research and Department

of Sociology, University of California, Berkeley
The American Family in Relation to Demographic Change

Day, Lincoln H.

Demographic and Social Statistics Branch, Statistical Office,

United Nations
The Social Consequences of a Zero Population Growth Rate

in the United States

Demeny, Paul

East-West Population Institute, University of Hawaii
Welfare Considerations in United States Population Policy

337

Drury, Robert F.

Consultant

Washington, D.C.

Local Governments and Population Change

Ehrlich, Paul R.

Department of Biological Sciences, Stanford University

and
John P. Holdren
Lawrence Radiation Laboratory, University of California,

Berkeley
Impact of Population Growth

Elazar, Daniel J.

Department of Political Science, Temple University

Population Growth and the Federal System

Farley, Reynolds

Population Studies Center, University of Michigan
Fertility and Mortality Trends Among Blacks in the United
States

Fischman, Leonard L.
Economic Associates, Inc.

and
Hans H. Landsberg
Resources for the Future, Inc.
Adequacy of Nonfuel Minerals and Forest Resources

Fortney, Judith A.

Department of Sociology and Center for the Study of Aging

and Human Development, Duke University
Immigration Into the United States With Special Reference to

Professional and Technical Workers

Freedman, Jonathan L.

Department of Psychology, Columbia University
A Conceptualization of Crowding

Population Density, Juvenile Delinquency, and Mental Illness
in New York City

Frejka, Tomas
The Population Council

Demographic Paths to a Stationary Population: The U. S. in
International Comparison

Fuguitt, Glen V.

College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, University of Wis-
consin

Population Trends of Nonmetropolitan Cities and Villages in
the United States

338

Gold, Neil M.
Suburban Action Institute

The Mismatch of Jobs and Low-Income People in Metro-
politan Areas and Its Implication for the Central-City Poor

Gordon, Sol

College for Human Development and Center for Family
Planning and Population Information, Syracuse University
Family Planning Education for Adolescents

Grumm, John G.

Department of Government, Wesleyan University

Population Change and State Government Policy

Hansen, Niles M.

Center for Economic Development, University of Texas

The Case for Government- Assisted Migration

Hetrick, Carl C, A. E. Keir Nash, and Alan J. Wyner
Department of Political Science, University of California,

Santa Barbara
Population and Politics: Information, Concern, and Policy

Support Among the American Public

Hoch, Irving

Resources for the Future, Inc.

Urban Scale and Environmental Quality

Hoover, Edgar M.

Department of Economics, University of Pittsburgh

Policy Objectives for Population Distribution

Reduced Population Growth and the Problems of Urban Areas

Howard, John A., and Donald R. Lehman
Graduate School of Business, Columbia University
The Effect of Different Populations on Selected Industries in
the Year 2000

Irwin, Richard, and Robert Warren

U. S. Bureau of the Census

Demographic Aspects of American Immigration

Jaffe, Frederick S.

Center for Family Planning Program Development, Planned

Parenthood-World Population
Family Planning Services in the United States

Johnston, Denis F.

U. S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and Department of Sociology,

Georgetown University
Illustrative Projections of the Labor Force of the United

States to 2040

339

Jones, David

Department of Economics, Indiana University
Projections of Housing Demand to the Year 2000, Using Two
Population Projections

Jones, Elise F., and Charles F. Westoff
Office of Population Research, Princeton University
Attitudes Toward Abortion in the United States in 1970 and
the Trend Since 1965

Kantner, John F., and Melvin Zelnik

Department of Population Dynamics, School of Hygiene and

Public Health, Johns Hopkins University
Sexuality, Contraception, and Pregnancy Among Pre- Adult

Females in the United States

Keely, Charles B.

Department of Sociology, Western Michigan University

Immigration: Considerations on Trends, Prospects, and Policy

Keller, Suzanne

Department of Sociology, Princeton University

The Future Status of Women in America

Kelley, Allen C.

Department of Economics, University of Wisconsin
Demographic Changes and American Economic Development:
Past, Present, and Future with Comment by Richard Easter-
lin, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania

Kitagawa, Evelyn M.

Department of Sociology and Population Research Center,

University of Chicago
Socioeconomic Differences in Mortality in the United States

and Some Implications for Population Policy

Lehne, Richard

Department of Political Science, Rutgers University

Population Change and Congressional Representation

Leibenstein, Harvey

Department of Economics, Harvard University
The Impact of Population Growth on the American Economy
with Comment by Edgar M. Hoover, Department of Eco-
nomics, University of Pittsburgh

Leven, Charles L.

Institute for Urban and Regional Studies, Washington Uni-
versity
Changing Sizes, Forms, and Functions of Urban Areas

340

Lowi, Theodore

Department of Political Science, University of Chicago

Population Policies and the American Political System

Manvel, Allen D.

Consultant

Washington, D.C.

Metropolitan Growth and Governmental Fragmentation

McGrath, Dorn C, Jr.

Department of Urban and Regional Planning, School of Gov-
ernment and Business Administration, George Washington
University

Population Growth and Change: Implications for Planning

Menken, Jane A.

Office of Population Research, Princeton University
Teenage Childbearing: Its Medical Aspects and Implications
for the United States Population

Miller, Arthur S.

National Law Center, George Washington University

Population Policy-Making and the Constitution

Mills, Edwin S.

Department of Economics, Princeton University

Economic Aspects of City Size

Morrison, Peter A.

Rand Corporation

Dimensions of the Population Problem in the United States

The Impact of Population Stabilization on Migration and
Redistribution

Population Movements: Where the Public and Private Inter-
ests Conflict

Population Movements and the Shape of Urban Growth: Im-
plications for Public Policy

Morss, Elliott R.

Commission on Population Growth and the American Future
The Influence of Federal Government Activities on the Family
Decision to Have a Child

Murray, Edward E., and Ned Hege

Urban Land Institute

Growth Center Population Redistribution 1980-2000

Noonan, John T., Jr., and Mary Cynthia Dunlap
School of Law, University of California, Berkeley
Unintended Consequences: Laws Indirectly Affecting Popula-
tion Growth in the United States

341

North, Robert C.

Department of Political Science, Stanford University

and
Nazli Choucri
Department of Political Science, Massachusetts Institute of

Technology
Population and the International System: Some Implications

for United States Policy and Planning

Oppenheimer, Valerie Kincade

Department of Sociology, University of California, Los An-
geles

Rising Educational Attainment, Declining Fertility and the
Inadequacies of the Female Labor Market

Organski, A.F.K., and Alan Lamborn

Department of Political Science, University of Michigan

and
Bruno Bueno de Mesquita

Department of Political Science, Michigan State University
The Effective Population in International Politics

Phelps, Edmund S.

Department of Economics, Columbia University

Some Macroeconomics of Population Levelling with Comment

by Robert Dorfman, Department of Economics, Harvard

University

Pickard, Jerome P.
Appalachian Regional Commission

U.S. Metropolitan Growth and Expansion, 1970-2000 with
Population Projections

Pilpel, Harriet F.

Member, New York Bar
and

Peter Ames

Member, Connecticut Bar

Legal Obstacles to Freedom of Choice in the Areas of Con-
traception, Abortion, and Voluntary Sterilization in the
United States

Piotrow, Phyllis T.
The Population Crisis Committee

Congressional-Executive Relations in the Formation of Ex-
plicit Population Policy

Presser, Harriet B.

School of Public Health and Administrative Medicine and In-

342

ternational Institute for Study of Human Reproduction,

Columbia University

and

Larry L. Bumpass

Department of Sociology and Center for Demography and
Ecology, University of Wisconsin

Demographic and Social Aspects of Contraceptive Steriliza-
tion in the United States: 1965-1970

Preston, Samuel H.

Department of Demography, University of California,

Berkeley
Female Employment Policy and Fertility

Reed, Ritchie H., and Susan Mcintosh

Commission on Population Growth and the American Future

Costs of Children

Ridker, Ronald G.

Resources for the Future, Inc.

Resource and Environmental Consequences of Population

Growth in the United States: A Summary
The Economy, Resource Requirements, and Pollution Levels
Future Water Needs and Supplies, with a Note on Land Use
The Model (with H. W. Herzog, Jr.)

Ridley, Jeanne Clare

School of Public Health and Administrative Medicine and In-
ternational Institute for Study of Human Reproduction,
Columbia University

On the Consequences of Demographic Change for the Roles
and Status of Women

Rindfuss, Ronald R.

Office of Population Research, Princeton University

Recent Trends in Population Attitudes

Rundquist, Barry S., P. G. Bock, Anthony M. Champagne, and
Karl F. Johnson

Department of Political Science, University of Illinois, Ur-
bana-Champaign

The Impact of Defense Cutbacks on Employment and Migra-
tion

Ryder, Norman B.

Office of Population Research, Princeton University

A Demographic Optimum Projection for the United States

Ryder, Norman B., and Charles F. Westoff

Office of Population Research, Princeton University

Unwanted Childbearing in the United States: 1970

343

Segal, Sheldon

The Population Council

Possible Means of Fertility Control: Distant or Near

Smith, Frank Austin

Center for the Environment and Man, Inc.

Waste Material Recovery and Reuse

Smith, Frederick J.

Graduate School of Design, Harvard University

Ecological Perspectives

Spengler, Joseph J.

Department of Economics, Duke University

Declining Population Growth: Economic Effects with Com-
ment by Warren Robinson, Department of Economics,
Pennsylvania State University

Taeuber, Irene B.

Office of Population Research, Princeton University

Growth of the Population of the United States in the Twentieth

Century
The Changing Distribution of the Population of the United

States in the Twentieth Century

Teitelbaum, Michael S.

Office of Population Research, Princeton University

International Experience with Fertility at or Near Replace-

ment Level
Some Genetic Implications of Population Policies

Tietze, Christopher, M.D.
The Population Council

The Potential Impact of Legal Abortion on Population Growth
in the United States

Viederman, Stephen
The Population Council

Population Education in the Elementary and Secondary
Schools of the United States

Vines, Kenneth N.

Department of Political Science, State University of New

York, Buffalo
Population and the Administration of Justice

344

CONSULTANTS

James E. Allen, Carolina Population Center, University of
North Carolina

William Alonso, Institute of Urban and Regional Development
and Department of City and Regional Planning, University
of California, Berkeley

Peter Ames, Member, Connecticut Bar

Peter Bachrach, Department of Political Science, Temple Uni-
versity

Edward Banfield, Department of Government, Harvard Uni-
versity

Calvin L. Beale, Economic Research Service, U.S. Department
of Agriculture

Benjamin S. Bradshaw, Population Research Center, Univer-
sity of Texas

Benjamin Branch, M.D., Medical Director, Preterm, Washing-
ton, D.C.

Richard Burton, The Urban Institute, Washington, D.C.

Daniel Callahan, Institute of Society, Ethics and the Life Sci-
ences

William D. Carey, Arthur D. Little, Inc., Washington, D.C.

Lenora T. Cartright, Center for Urban Studies, University of
Illinois

345

Robert Lee Chartrand, Legislative Reference Service, Library
of Congress

Preston Cloud, Department of Geological Sciences, University
of California, Santa Barbara

Ansley J. Coale, Office of Population Research, Princeton Uni-
versity

Barry Commoner, Center for the Biology of Natural Systems,
Washington University

Phillips Cutright, Department of Sociology, Indiana University

Michael N. Danielson, Woodrow Wilson School of Public and
International Affairs, Princeton University

Kingsley Davis, International Population and Urban Research
and Department of Sociology, University of California,
Berkeley

Robert G. Dixon, Jr., National Law Center, George Washing-
ton University

Robert Dorfman, Department of Economics, Harvard Uni-
versity

Anthony Downs, Real Estate Research Corporation, Chicago,
Illinois

Edwin D. Driver, Department of Sociology, University of
Massachusetts

Robert F. Drury, Consultant, Washington, D.C.

Richard A. Easterlin, Department of Economics, University
of Pennsylvania

Paul R. Ehrlich, Department of Biological Sciences, Stanford
University

Stephen Enke, General Electric TEMPO, Center for Advanced
Studies, Washington, D.C.

Edward J. Ennis, Attorney at Law, New York, New York

Cynthia Fuchs Epstein, Queens College of The City University
of New York and Bureau of Applied Social Research, Co-
lumbia University

Judith A. Fortney, Department of Sociology and Center for the
Study of Aging and Human Development, Duke Univer-
sity

Maurice Fulton, President, The Fantus Company, Chicago

346

Sol Gordon, College for Human Development and Center for
Family Planning and Population Information, Syracuse
University

Naomi T. Gray, Naomi Gray Associates, Inc., New York, New
York

John Grumm, Department of Government, Wesleyan Uni-
versity

Robert E. Hall, M.D., Department of Obstetrics and Gynecol-
ogy, College of Physicians and Surgeons, Columbia Univer-
sity

Niles M. Hansen, Center for Economic Development, Univer-
sity of Texas

Edgar M. Hoover, Department of Economics, University of
Pittsburgh

John A. Howard, Graduate School of Business, Columbia
University

Richard Irwin, U.S. Bureau of Census

Frederick S. Jaffe, Center for Family Planning Program Devel-
opment, Planned Parenthood- World Population

John F. Kain, Department of Economics, Harvard University

Allen C. Kelley, Department of Economics, University of Wis-
consin

Donald R. Lehman, Graduate School of Business, Columbia
University

Harvey Leibenstein, Department of Economics, Harvard Uni-
versity

Seymour Martin Lipset, Department of Government, Harvard
University

Allen D. Manvel, Consultant, Washington, D.C.

Alan Margolis, Department of Obstetrics/Gynecology, Univer-
sity of California Medical Center, San Francisco

Donald R. Matthews, The Brookings Institution

Donald N. Michael, Institute for Social Research, University of
Michigan

Arthur S. Miller, National Law Center, George Washington
University

347

Edwin S. Mills, Department of Economics, Princeton Univer-
sity
Peter A. Morrison, RAND Corporation

Frank W. Notestein, Office of Population Research, Princeton
University

A.F.K. Organski, Department of Political Science, University
of Michigan

Anthony Pascal, RAND Corporation

Edmund S. Phelps, Department of Economics, Columbia Uni-
versity

Jerome P. Pickard, Appalachian Regional Commission

Harriet F. Pilpel, Member, New York Bar

Ronald J. Pion, M.D., School of Public Health, University of
Hawaii

James W. Prothro, Carolina Population Center, University of
North Carolina

Ronald G. Ridker, Resources for the Future, Inc.

Randall B. Ripley, Department of Political Science, Ohio State
University

Warren C. Robinson, Department of Economics, Pennsylvania
State University

Norman B. Ryder, Office of Population Research, Princeton
University

Richard Scammon, Election Research Center, Washington,
D.C.

Allan Schick, The Brookings Institution

Sheldon J. Segal, The Population Council

M. Brewster Smith, University of California, Santa Cruz

Robert G. Smith, Management Consultant, Washington, D.C.

Frank J. Sorauf, Department of Political Science, University of
Minnesota

Joseph J. Spengler, Department of Economics, Duke Univer-
sity

J. Mayone Stycos, Department of Sociology, Cornell Univer-
sity

348

James L. Sundquist, The Brookings Institution

Conrad Taeuber, U.S. Bureau of the Census

Irene B. Taeuber, Office of Population Research, Princeton
University

Michael S. Teitelbaum, Office of Population Research, Prince-
ton University

Vaida D. Thompson, Carolina Population Center, University
of North Carolina

Christopher Tietze, M.D., The Population Council

Stephen Viederman, The Population Council

Ben J. Wattenberg, Author and Consultant, Washington, D.C.

Charles V. Willie, Vice President for Student Activities and
Organization, Syracuse University

Robert C. Wood, President, University of Massachusetts

349

CONSULTING ORGANIZATIONS

Institute of Society, Ethics and the Life Sciences, Hastines-on-
Hudson, N.Y. '

Opinion Research Corporation, Princeton, N.J.

RAND Corporation, Santa Monica, Calif.

Resources for the Future, Inc., Washington, D.C.

ULI — The Urban Land Institute, Washington, D.C.

U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, Wash-
ington, D.C.

U.S. Department of Commerce, Office of Business Economics,
Washington, D.C.

350

PARTICIPANTS IN PUBLIC HEARINGS

(in order of appearance)

Washington, D.C., April 14-15, 1971

The Hon. Donald Rumsfeld, Counsellor to President Richard

M. Nixon
The Hon. John G. Veneman, Under Secretary, U.S. Depart-
ment of Health, Education and Welfare

Gooloo Wunderlich, Demographer, Office of Popula-

lation Affairs
Carl Schultz, M.D., Director, Office of Population
Affairs

Wilma Scott Heide, National Chairwoman, National Organi-
zation for Women

General Andrew O'Meara (USA Ret.), National Chairman,
Population Crisis Committee, Washington, D.C.

Phyllis T. Piotrow, Consultant, Population Crisis Committee,
Washington, D.C.

Donald Paarlberg, Director, Agricultural Economics, U.S. De-
partment of Agriculture

Lynn M. Daft, Assistant Deputy Administrator, Eco-
nomic Research Service

The Hon. Stewart Udall, Lawyer, Environmental Columnist;
former Secretary of the Interior

Rev. Monsignor James T. McHugh, Director, Family Life
Division, United States Catholic Conference, Washing-
ton, D.C.

351

Alan C. Guttmacher, M.D., President, Planned Parenthood-
World Population

Milo Macura, Director, Population Division, United Nations

Roger Revelle, Chairman, Department of Demography, School
of Public Health, Harvard University

George Hay Brown, Director, Bureau of the Census
Conrad Taeuber, Associate Director
Herman P. Miller, Chief, Population Division

Carl Pope, Washington Representative, Zero Population
Growth

Naomi T. Gray, President, Naomi Gray Associates, Inc.,
Family Planning Consultants, New York, N.Y.

Rufus E. Miles, President, Population Reference Bureau,
Washington, D.C.

John Tanton, National Chairman, Sierra Club Population
Committee

Carl H. Madden, Chief Economist, Chamber of Commerce of
the U.S., Washington, D.C.

Bradley Byers and Gerald Barney, Arlington Committee on
Optimum Growth, Arlington, Va.

Rev. David O. Poindexter, Director, Population Communica-
tions Center, United Methodist Church, New York, N.Y.

Robert Lamson, Staff Associate, Plans and Analysis Office,
National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C.

Los Angeles, California, May 3-4f 1971

S. I. Hayakawa, President, San Francisco State College,
John Westfall, Chairman, Geography Department

The Hon. Jerome Waldie, U.S. House of Representatives,
14th C. District, California

Mrs. Tee Bertha Spring, Member, Board of Directors, Los
Angeles Regional Planning Council

Henry Gibson, Television Entertainer, Malibu

Kingsley Davis, Professor of Sociology, International Popula-
tion and Urban Research and Dept. of Sociology, Univer-
sity of California, Berkeley

352

Frederic G. Styles, Executive Director, Science and
Technology Advisory Council, California State
Assembly

Eduardo Arriaga, University of California, Berkeley

Manuel Aragon, Jr., General Manager, City of Commerce
Investment Company; former Executive Director, Economic
and Youth Opportunity Agency, Los Angeles County

Kenneth M. Mitzner, President, Mobilization for the Un-
named, Los Angeles

Joe C. Ortega, Associate Counsel, Mexican-American Legal
Defense and Education Fund, Inc.

Walter R. Trinkaus, President, Right to Life League of South-
ern California; Professor of Law, Loyola University of
Los Angeles

Judith Ayala, Registered Nurse, Los Angeles

Johnson C. Montgomery, Attorney, representing Zero Popula-
tion Growth, Palo Alto

Stuart W. Knight, Attorney, Anaheim

The Hon. Tom Bradley, Los Angeles City Council

Addie Klotz, M.D., Director of Student Council Services, San
Fernando Valley State College, and three students

David S. Hall, Senior Public Health Educator, Los Angeles
County Public Health Department

Laura Anderson, Coordinator, Comprehensive Family Plan-
ning Program, Berkeley

Calvin S. Hamilton, Director of Planning, City of Los Angeles

Clarence R. Allen, Professor of Geology and Geophysics,
Seismological Laboratory, California Institute of Technol-
ogy, Los Angeles

Walt Thompson, Chairman, Journalism Department, Laney
College, Oakland

Alfred Heller, Director, California Tomorrow, San Francisco

Ernest Loebbeke, Past President, California State Chamber of
Commerce, Los Angeles

Robert Sassone, President, League for Infants, Fetuses and
the Elderly, Santa Ana

353

James Edinger, Associate Professor of Meteorology, Univer-
sity of California, Los Angeles

Rits Tadema, Westminster

Little Rock, Arkansas, June 7-8, 1971

The Hon. John L. McClellan, U.S. Senate, Arkansas

The Hon. David Pryor, U.S. House of Representatives, 4th C.
District, Arkansas

Eddie White, Seasonal Farm Worker, Altheimer

Colin Clark, International Economist; Fellow of Monasch
University, Melbourne, Australia

William (Sonny) Walker, Director, Equal Opportunity Divi-
sion, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Develop-
ment, Little Rock

Gordon D. Morgan, Professor of Sociology, University of
Arkansas, Fayetteville

The Hon. Winthrop Rockefeller, Former Governor of Arkan-
sas, Little Rock

Calvin L. Beale, Economic Research Service, U.S. Depart-
ment of Agriculture, Washington, D.C.

Mariah Gilmore, Trainee in Operation Mainstream, a project
funded by Opportunities Industrialization Center, Little
Rock

Mrs. Mitchell, Counselor, Opportunities Industrializa-
tion Center, Little Rock

Barton A. Westerlund, Director, Industrial Research and Ex-
tension Center, College of Business Administration, Uni-
versity of Arkansas, Fayetteville

Jason Rouby, Executive Director, Metroplan, Little Rock

John H. Opitz, Executive Director, The Ozarks Regional Com-
mission, Washington, D.C.

William W. Blunt, Jr. Chief Counsel, Economic development
Administration, U.S. Department of Commerce, Washing-
ton, D.C.

William C. Nolan, Jr., Vice President, El Dorado Chamber of
Commerce

354

Paul Stabler, Field Representative for the Oklahoma Indian
Affairs Commission, Tulsa, Oklahoma

Russell Thomas, Director of Industrial Relations, Wolverine
Toy Company, Cooneville

David L. Barclay, M.D., Professor and Chairman of the
Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, University of
Arkansas Medical Center

Rex Ramsey, M.D., Director of Maternal and Child
Health Division, Arkansas State Health Department

Trusten H. Holder, Private Consultant in the areas of eco-
logical studies, outdoor recreation, environmental planning,
Little Rock

Pratt Remmel, Jr., Director, Arkansas Ecology Center, Little
Rock

The Hon. Dale Bumpers, Governor of Arkansas

E. L. Bud Stewart, Jr., Federal Co-Chairman, the Ozarks Re-
gional Commission, Washington, D.C.

Chicago, Illinois, June 21-22, 1971

Philip M. Hauser, Professor of Sociology, University of Chi-
cago

The Hon. Alderman Marilou Hedlund, Member Chicago City
Council

Jeffrey R. Short, Jr., President, J. R. Short Milling Company,
Chicago

Richard Babcock, Attorney, Past President, American Society
of Planning Officials, Chicago

Lawrence B. Christmas, Technical Director, Northeastern Illi-
nois Planning Commission, Chicago

Norman Lazarus, President, N. Lazarus Company, Chicago

John Yolton, Administrative Assistant to Olga Madar, Vice
President of the United Auto Workers, Detroit, Michigan

Conrad E. Terrien, Chemical Engineer, Villa Park

Rev. Don C. Shaw, Executive Director, Midwest Population
Center, Chicago

Ellen Peck, Author, Baltimore, Maryland

355

Rev. Jesse Jackson, National Director, Operation Breadbasket,
Chicago

Anthony Downs, Senior Vice President, Real Estate Research
Corporation, Chicago

Jean Phillips, Senior at Northeastern Illinois State College,
Chicago

John E. Lester, student, Northeastern Illinois State College,
Chicago

Frances Freeh, Housewife, Kansas City, Missouri

The Hon. William Cousins, Member, Chicago City Council

lone Du Val, Director of Immigrant Services, The Travelers
Aid Society of Metropolitan Chicago

Fred Domville, Oak Park

New York, New York, September 27-28, 1971

The Hon. Percy Sutton, President, Borough of Manhattan

Gordon Chase, Health Services Administrator, City of New
York, and Chairman, Health and Hospital Corporation

Timothy Costello, Deputy Mayor, City of New York

George Trombetta, M.D., Chief of Obstetrics and Gynecology,
Highland Hospital, Rochester

Alyce Friend, Family Planning Counselor, Rochester

Sylvester Charleston, Student, Bernard Baruch College, New
York, N.Y.

Harriet Surovell, High School Women's Coalition, New York,

N.Y.

Frank Febus, Student, New York Institute of Photography

Bill Baird, Lecturer on Abortion and Birth Control; Director
of the Parents' Aid Society, Hempstead, Long Island

Robert M. Byrn, Professor of Law, Fordham University
School of Law

Bernard Pisani, M.D., Director, Department of Obstetrics and
Gynecology, St. Vincent's Hospital, New York, N.Y.

Alvin F. Moran, Executive Vice President, Planned Parent-
hood of New York, N.Y.

356

Donald Hohl, Assistant Director of Migration and Refugee
Services, U.S. Catholic Conference, Washington, D.C.

Edward J. Logue, President, New York State Urban Develop-
ment Corporation

Mr. Magee, New York, N.Y.

Paul Ylvisaker, Professor of Public Affairs and Urban Plan-
ning, Princeton University

Betty Rollin, Author, New York, N.Y.

Patricia Cooper, Director, Pennsport Civic Association, Phila-
delphia

Mrs. Fizur, Community Worker, Philadelphia

Joseph Monserrat, New York City Board of Education, for-
mer Director of Migration Services, Department of Labor,
Puerto Rico

Robert O. Anderson, Chairman of the Board, Chief Execu-
tive Officer, Atlantic-Richfield Company, New York, N.Y.

Irving Stern, Director of Local 342, Amalgamated Meat Cut-
ters and Retail Food Store Employees Union; International
Vice President, Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butchers
Union; Vice President, New York City Central Labor
Council

Eugene S. Callender, President, New York Urban Coalition

357

MANDATES

Public Law 91-213
91st Congress, S. 2701
March 16, 1970

AN ACT

To establish a Commission on Population Growth
and the American Future.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Repre-
sentatives of the United States of America in Con-
gress assembled, That the Commission on Popula-
tion Growth and the American Future is hereby
established to conduct and sponsor such studies
and research and make such recommendations as
may be necessary to provide information and edu-
cation to all levels of government in the United
States, and to our people, regarding a broad range
of problems associated with population growth and
their implications for America's future.

Commission
on Population
Growth and
the American
Future.
Establish-
ment.

MEMBERSHIP OF COMMISSION

Sec. 2. (a) The Commission on Population
Growth and the American Future (hereinafter re-
ferred to as the "Commission") shall be composed
of—

(1) two Members of the Senate who shall

be members of different political parties and

358

who shall be appointed by the President of the
Senate;

(2) two Members of the House of Repre-
sentatives who shall be members of different
political parties and who shall be appointed by
the Speaker of the House of Representatives;
and

84 STAT. 67

(3) not to exceed twenty members ap- 84 stat. 68
pointed by the President.

(b) The President shall designate one of the
members to serve as Chairman and one to serve
as Vice Chairman of the Commission.

COMPENSATION OF MEMBERS OF THE
COMMISSION

Sec. 3. (a) Members of the Commission who
are officers or full-time employees of the United
States shall serve without compensation in addi-
tion to that received for their services as officers or
employees of the United States.

(b) Members of the Commission who are not
officers or full-time employees of the United States
shall each receive $100 per diem when engaged
in the actual performance of duties vested in the
Commission.

(c) All members of the Commission shall be
allowed travel expenses, including per diem in lieu
of subsistence, as authorized by section 5703 of
title 5 of the United States Code for persons in

the Government service employed intermittently. 8° STAT- 499;

83 STAT. 190.

DUTIES OF THE COMMISSION

Sec. 4. The Commission shall conduct an in-
quiry into the following aspects of population

359

growth in the United States and its foreseeable
social consequences:

(1) the probable course of population
growth, internal migration, and related demo-
graphic developments between now and the
year 2000;

(2) the resources in the public sector of
the economy that will be required to deal with
the anticipated growth in population;

(3) the ways in which population growth
may affect the activities of Federal, State, and
local government;

(4) the impact of population growth on
environmental pollution and on the depletion
of natural resources; and

(5) the various means appropriate to the
ethical values and principles of this society by
which our Nation can achieve a population level
properly suited for its environmental, natural
resources, and other needs.

STAFF OF THE COMMISSION

Sec. 5. (a) The Commission shall appoint an
Executive Director and such other personnel as
the Commission deems necessary without regard l^s^oi3©?"
to the provisions of title 5 of the United States $eq.
Code governing appointments in the competitive
service and shall fix the compensation of such per- 459?™* 443,
sonnel without regard to the provisions of chapter
51 and subtitle II of chapter 53 of such title re-
lating to classification and General Schedule pay
rates: Provided, That no personnel so appointed
shall receive compensation in excess of the rate
authorized for GS-18 by section 5332 of such title.

(b) The Executive Director, with the approval f^^ffj5*
of the Commission, is authorized to obtain ser- note,
vices in accordance with the provisions of section
3109 of title 5 of the United States Code, but at so stat. 416.
rates for individuals not to exceed the per diem
equivalent of the rate authorized for GS-18 by
section 5332 of such title.

360

(C) The Commission is authorized to enter into
contracts with public agencies, private firms, insti- SSthorSJv-
tutions, and individuals for the conduct of research
and surveys, the preparation of reports, and other
activities necessary to the discharge of its duties. 84 STAT- 6*

84 STAT. 69

GOVERNMENT AGENCY COOPERATION

Sec. 6. The Commission is authorized to request
from any Federal department or agency any infor-
mation and assistance it deems necessary to carry
out its functions; and each such department or
agency is authorized to cooperate with the Com-
mission and, to the extent permitted by law, to fur-
nish such information and assistance to the Com-
mission upon request made by the Chairman or
any other member when acting as Chairman.

ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES

Sec. 7. The General Services Administration
shall provide administrative services for the Com-
mission on a reimbursable basis.

REPORTS OF COMMISSION:
TERMINATION

Sec. 8. In order that the President and the Con-
gress may be kept advised of the progress of its
work, the Commission shall, from time to time,
report to the President and the Congress such sig-
nificant findings and recommendations as it deems
advisable. The Commission shall submit an interim
report to the President and the Congress one year
after it is established and shall submit its final re-
port two years after the enactment of this Act.
The Commission shall cease to exist sixty days
after the date of the submission of its final report.

361

AUTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS 84 stat. 69

Sec. 9. There are hereby authorized to be ap-
propriated, out of any money in the Treasury not
otherwise appropriated, such amounts as may be
necessary to carry out the provisions of this Act.

Approved March 16, 1970

362

IF YOU ARE CONCERNED WITH THE
FUTURE OF MAN AND THE QUALITY OF LIFE.
THE TIME HAS COME TO ASK WHAT LEVEL
OF POPULATION GROWTH IS GOOD
FOR THE UNITED STATES!

ONE HUNDRED YEARS FROM NOW THE TWO-CHiLD FAMILY
WOULD RESULT IN A POPULATION OF 340 MILLION PERSONS; THE
THREE-CHILD AVERAGE WOULP PRODUCE NEARLY A BILLION.

Wfeighty questions have been raised about the perils of population growth
and its effects on our own and world resources. A sense of earthly limits has
come into our consciousness; we are aware that the elements of life are
interconnected and they have to be considered together. It is not simply
population growth itself that is the issue, but rather the environmental, eco-
nomic, political and social problems that are aggravated by growth and den-
sity, and which threaten to impair the quality of life in the United States.

The Commission on Population Growth And The American Future, headed
by John D. Rockefeller 3rd, was established by Congress in response to a
proposal by President Nixon to assess the impact of continued growth in our
country. This landmark report, the result of a two-year study of research
and public hearings, examines every aspect of uncontrolled growth and its
implications to human society. HERE IS A WORK THAT IS MUST
READING FOR EVERY AMERICAN CONCERNED WITH HIS
NATION'S FUTURE.

NEWAMERICANLIBRARYPUBLISHESSIGNET,SIGNETTE.MENTOR,CUSSIC,PLUME&NAL BOOKS

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